


Neptune's Moon

by statikos



Series: Neptune's Moon [1]
Category: Free!
Genre: M/M, Marine Park AU, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-04
Updated: 2014-12-06
Packaged: 2018-02-03 09:30:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 56,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1739726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/statikos/pseuds/statikos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>With the arrival of its first ever killer whale, the Iwatobi Aquarium and its staff end up getting a lot more than they bargained for. For Nanase Haruka, senior trainer, it could be the beginning of a once-in-a-lifetime career... or the end of his worldview as he knows it.<br/>[ Marine Park AU; anti-captivity. ]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> DISCLAIMER: I am against captivity for dolphins and other marine mammals, but respect that the issue is complex and that it will take time for others to change their points of view.  
> My research for this story has been in progress since at least December, and continues to this day. Many events in the story are based on real events or common occurrences in marine parks all over the world. I've tried my best to portray everything from feeding to captures, training protocols and husbandry procedures as accurately as possible, but of course do not presume to know exactly how everything works in a real Japanese marine park.  
> However for the record, this story contains fantastical elements as well so I would encourage you to suspend your disbelief as much as you can and take it for what it is; a story about people and their relationships with animals, the ocean and each other.  
> I want to educate as much as entertain, so when I can, I will accompany each chapter with a link or quote about killer whales, in captivity and otherwise.
> 
> I don't want to talk too much here, but if you like the story--or hate it, that's fine--please leave a comment and tell me how you feel. I'd love to hear from you. :)
> 
> This story is for Tori, my partner and inspiration, always.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> **Excerpt from "Captive Orcas: Dying to Entertain You" by Vanessa Williams, 2001, for the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, Chippenham, UK, specifically pertaining to Japanese captures:**
> 
>  
> 
> "To date, no marine park outside Japan has purchased orcas taken from Japanese waters. Captures for dolphinariums have been largely unregulated, being carried out by inexperienced local fishermen using two main methods - harpooning, and herding the animals into a net. Capture methods can be very crude - attempts to wrestle the whales into submission by riding them 'rodeo-style' have been reported. Several orcas have died shortly after capture: for example, three orcas captured off Japan in 1979 had all died within three months of capture. The better Japanese marine parks, perhaps wary of being tainted by association with 'iruka no oikomi ryo', the annual drive fishery responsible for the slaughter of thousands of small whales and dolphins, have increasingly turned to Iceland and North America for their orcas.  
> However, on February 7th, 1997, a group of ten orcas - believed to be transients - were taken at Hatajiri Bay, near Taiji, Wakayama prefecture. Fishermen from the Isana Fishing Co-operative first spotted the group of orcas, including two calves, about 50km off the Japanese coast. They sent eight fast boats out to encircle the pod and, by using water bombs and banging on iron rods to create a barrage of noise, succeeded in driving the group into the bay."

When he rolls onto his side, he can see the moonlight shimmering on the water's surface. Mother swims ahead of him, Ren hugged tight to her side, Ran half a body-length behind. She's lagging, in spite of her vigor; Makoto moves beneath her, guides her up with his rostrum. Then as one they beat their powerful tails and break the surface, breathing deep in unison. The rest of the pod is not far behind them, and as they join them at the surface Makoto falls back to join the other males, whistling a temporary farewell to his mother and siblings.

They stay at the surface and breathe, all twelve of them together. He hears his mother's voice clear and strong over the sound of blowholes opening and closing, a song that speaks not only of what she means to say but what she _is_ , what they all are. Ran calls back and he can hear the same in her voice, the same in all their voices. It is a song they have all been taught since birth, that they might never forget where they belong. Years from now, when Mother stops swimming, Ran will teach it to her calves too, and they to theirs, and this way the song will always live. It will always—

The pod freezes; all twelve of them, the same muscles, the same moment. Something is wrong.

A high, cold clanging rings through the water, followed by a deep rumble that shudders through them roughly. He hears Ren squeak loudly and dive hurriedly, tiny body thrashing wildly to escape the wall of sound. Ran and the other youngsters follow suit, and Makoto and the other bulls follow them, keeping the pod's calves enclosed by their huge bodies.

One of the other males breaks the surface first, a long dark dorsal fin rippling in the sea wind. The _sound_ is closing in on them, jarring and skull-splitting, and he cannot help but call to Mother, even if he can barely hear his own voice above the cacophony. Echolocation proves impossible with the noise jammering each click; every time he tries, he gets a fuzzy, nonsensical picture back, so the pod must rely on eyesight, even as they surge into shallower waters and rile the ocean floor with each frantic thrust of their tails.

It is not until he surfaces once more and sees the fast approaching beach that he realises their mistake. The sound, though still present, is less frequent now... because it is no longer needed. When Makoto turns his body to swim back out of the cove, he sees the boats and the humans upon them, lowering something long and dark and heavy into the ocean. He's thankful for the silence, though his head still rings dreadfully. Mother comes to him first with a quiet call of concern; Mother who is so brave and calm is good enough to swim close to his side so their flippers touch, and she feels like a giant compared to how small Makoto thinks himself. Soon all of them are together at the surface, sinking and surfacing in alternation. Makoto can feel his whole body quivering as he calls to Mother. He does not know whether to pray she answers him or to pray she is too far to hear; that somehow she peeled away at the last moment and made it out of the cove. The situation isn't clear to him, not yet, but the panic that fills him each time he surfaces does not fade.

Finally, he hears a faint voice; _You are very brave._

He does not feel brave. He feels like a calf, squeaking wordlessly and burying its head below its dam's flippers. Ran and Ren are beside him, crying, and he hums softly to them and touches their bodies with his rostrum until they fall quiet again.

Mother is investigating the wall over the mouth of the cove. Then she turns, tucks her flippers in and swims at high speed toward it, breaching over the top of it and landing on the other side with a mighty splash. She's free; but the racket from before starts up again and Makoto panics, surging forward against the wall towards her.

She's calling them to her, but the calves can't make it over the wall; neither can he. In the end they're split seven-five, with most of the young trapped in the cove.

The sound begins again. This time there's a low, dreadful churning in the water, deep and metallic, that comes with it. Several huge, heavy shapes make their way towards them through the water. They're headed right for them in a straight line; headed right over where Mother and the others—

Too late, Makoto realises something and tries to call to the pod members on the other side of the net. _No! No!_

The water is full of screams, and that awful metallic noise; then, finally, a low crunch and a black cloud of blood.


	2. Haruka

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nothing from me this time, just didn't want to post the prologue on its own!
> 
>  **Quote from interview with Ted Griffin, the first man to acquire and train a killer whale back in 1962. [[source](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/whales/interviews/griffin.html)]**  
>     
> "And so the first few days in the water, the whale... no matter where I was... would come to me, always. And... even in the dead of night the whale would come up and I'd know the whale was there but I wouldn't know whether he was behind me or in front of me and I wouldn't be able to sense him. And he would be like an inch away but not touching me, and I'd reach around until I could feel his nose. And then I would caress his body with my hand, moving my hands over his body, and the whale liked to have that caressing. And we became great friends."

Cold water swallows Haruka piece by piece, and he is—as always—unafraid.

Aiko comes to him first; it's obvious from the shape of her dorsal fin. He doesn't have to turn his head to know the rest of the pod is on his other side. In this small space he can hear the water swirling around their beating tails. He feels Aiko move closer; she and another dolphin—Oona, he thinks, by the size—tuck their beaks under his arms and lift him up on their rostrums until his head breaks the surface. They guide him around the show pool at a speed impossible for man or any creature built for land, a surge of white spray behind them.

Beside the pool, Nagisa claps as the dolphins guide Haru back to solid ground and let his momentum carry him up onto the slide out. He skims a short distance through shallow water and sits up just in time to see the animals joining them at the edge of the pool. Aiko rolls over onto her side and gazes up at him expectantly with one eye.

“Haru-chan, you make the rest of us look so bad!” Nagisa joins him on the slideout with the fish bucket, and Haruka doesn't say a word as he scoops a herring from the bucket in each hand and goes to give Aiko and Oona their rewards.

Once they down the fish, both dolphins hesitate, then ultimately stay at the edge of the slideout, watching Haru with their dark eyes and ever-smiling mouths. He reaches out one hand quietly, and Oona lifts up out of the water to touch it gently with her beak. Nagisa laughs as the other dolphins—Koemi, Yoko and Baby—bob up beside their tank mates, squeaking insistently.

“You're so popular, Haru-chan,” Nagisa teases, “with all these girls who love you.”

“They don't love me,” Haru replies coolly, tugging the bucket closer with one hand to keep feeding, “they just want fish.”

Still, he looks at them sometimes and wonders. Their smiles might be a mere evolutionary coincidence, but the way they act can't be simply about their stomachs. If that was all it was, they might be fonder of Nagisa—who, Haru notes, is being squirted with water by Baby for the third time today.

“Ah! Hey, hey, squirt Haru-chan instead! He likes it!”

Haru throws Baby another fish, stopping that before it can start. Nagisa _does_ know the hand signals for the water-squirting trick, after all, and the last thing he needs before this morning is wet hair and salt-water in his eyes. In fact, the last thing he needs is _this morning_ , period.

Aiko nudges his empty hand, while Baby returns to bullying Nagisa. Haru watches her silently. He doesn't speak to the animals much; it seems unfair, almost, to use a language they can't be expected to master themselves. Sometimes, he feels more connection in the moments where he listens, even if it's to nothing.

 _No more fish,_ he tells her, showing her the empty bucket. Oona seems to immediately lose interest; Koemi and Yoko stay, apparently to watch Baby and Nagisa, who seem to be having a heated inter-species debate up until the moment Nagisa cracks and just bursts out laughing, leaning over to give her a kiss on the nose. Then he sits up on his knees again, tapping Haru's shoulder.

“Ready to move them? I can get more fish if you think it'll help.”

“No. They're okay.” And indeed, when Haru points to the opening into B pool, they all seem to understand where to go, even if it isn't their usual route. In fact, Baby squirts Nagisa again when he takes too long to open the gate.

“This is why you're being evicted, you know?” he pretends to scold, but when Haru joins him at the gate, he's beaming. “Aren't you excited?”

Haru's expression doesn't change. “Why?”

“About the whale, silly!”

“It's a pain having to move everything,” he replies.

“But not a pain getting a promotion, right?” When Haru doesn't respond, Nagisa changes gears, elbowing his side with a playful smirk. “And not a pain seeing Rin-chan again, _right_?”

“Close the gate, Nagisa.”

“ _Riiight_.”

 

* * *

 

This morning in the loading zone is the first time he has seen Rin face to face in several years. He's still tall and sharply built, somehow managing to look morose while wearing a bright red polarfleece over a full wetsuit. When he notices him, Haru sees his breath hitch to a halt and his eyes light up for a split second before they flicker away, feigning disinterest. Haru admits he didn't expect to elicit such a response after all this time.

Nagisa immediately goes to hug him and Haru hangs back, keeping quiet eye contact with Rin over his shoulder.

“Haru. Are you just going to stand there?” Rin smiles—a little twitchily—and holds out one of his arms. Nagisa remains attached to his front, but when Haru walks over to them he, too, welcomes him into the hug. As they stand there, Rin lays his head on his shoulder and sighs heavily, so he can feel the warm breath fluttering against his neck.

He steps away slowly. “Nice to see you.”

“Yeah. Your hair's wet. You were swimming already?”

“Haru-chan wanted to play with the dolphins before we moved them,” Nagisa supplies.

Haru shrugs. “It just happened.”

“Aren't you supposed to be getting ready for the orca?” Rin keeps holding his gaze for much longer than necessary, so Haru averts his eyes completely.

“We are ready.”

“Well, sort of.” Nagisa slings his arm casually around Haru's shoulders. “We're renovating our main dolphin tank for this guy, so he's going to stay in the show pool mostly in the meantime. Our med pool is pretty big, so he can go in there during the other shows.”

“Huh.” Rin's unconvinced tone has Haru looking at him again, which inevitably draws his attention. “So, you're the lucky one, right?”

“What?”

“The one who's going to train him.” He smiles again. “While _I_ train _you_.”

“Oh,” says Haru, “I suppose.”

“Haru-chan is excited on the inside,” puts in Nagisa.

He's wrong, actually, unless 'excited' and 'nauseous' are literally indistinguishable. In fact, in the past few days have been anything _but_ exciting; he and the other trainers have been measuring the dolphins' new tank—it had housed a pair of pilot whales, both of whom died late last year—and cleaning it almost constantly. He's satisfied with the water, at least, and the only other major maintenance complaint is some chipping paint on the east wall. It's fine, just... smaller than they're used to. There are five dolphins, and only one orca, so why can't _it_ live there? All of this seems so _unnecessary_ to him.

“Your dad sounds excited, too,” says Rin, jerking his head toward the man, who is already pacing busily around the stadium.

Nagisa grins. “Yeah, he was pretty happy. He's wanted an orca for ages—you know, to put us on the map!—but they're not exactly easy to find for sale...”

“Yeah. Weird getting them in Japan, too... most of ours were from Iceland.”

It seems as if he's about to elaborate, but Nagisa breaks in; “Didn't you have a baby?!”

“What?! No! I'm not even—”  
“Not _you_ , Rin-chan, your whales!”

“O-oh, right.” Rin sighs, as if it's such a _chore_ for him to deal with people who can startle him so easily. “Yeah, last year. It was Calypso's. Atlas was the father, probably.”

“Are those really their names?” Haru asks.

Rin frowns. “Yeah.”

“Weird,” he mumbles.

At that, Rin laughs at him. “Yeah? You're just saying that because you can't even pronounce them. You better hope your orca doesn't get an English name, or you'll be screwed.”

Nagisa pats him firmly on the back. “We _do_ have a dolphin with an English name, and Haru-chan can say it just fine!”

“'Baby',” Haru says insistently.

“Okay, okay.” Rin lifts his hands in surrender, but he's staring again. “'Baby'.”

Unhelpfully, Nagisa “ooh”s and lifts his hand off Haru's back. “I'd better leave you two alone, huh?”

Rin decides to play it cool. It comes off, in Haru's opinion, decidedly lukewarm. “Well, I don't know if—”

“It's fine,” says Haru. Then, mercifully, all three of them are interrupted by the rumble of engines.

Normally at this time of day, the park might be welcoming its first guests, but Director Hazuki has closed the visitor's entrance for the first half of the day. Instead, it welcomes a crane and a truck towing a large, metal crate through the service gates.

“Whoa,” exclaims Nagisa, “that big?”

“They're the largest animals to be kept in captivity,” Rin tells him proudly. “Of _course_ it's big.”

Haru says nothing, but proceeds back toward the show pool, where the other staff are already gathered. Nagisa's three sisters are in various states of excitement; Maiha and Shione, ready and waiting in their wetsuits, have their arms around one another and are chatting excitedly, while gentle Nanami waits quietly, hands over her mouth.

Everyone stands well back to make way as the crane gets into position. Then Director Hazuki assumes his position on the show stage, raising his hand and beckoning the rest of the staff, who clamour around quickly. Haru feels himself retreating automatically to the back of the crowd; then Rin's hand flattens against the small of his back and guides him to the front. He scowls in response, and Rin only smirks.

“Could I have your attention, please?” Director Hazuki's voice resonates through the stadium with the cheerful charisma of a talk show host; it's a trait that Nagisa has inherited from him, and then some. The staff fall silent and watch him intently. Haru stares past his shoulder into the water, imagining he can see Aiko peeking over the gates. Rin bumps his shoulder with his to keep him focussed.

“In a few moments,” the director continues, pointing toward the assembled machinery, “that crane will lower into the crate. The animal it lifts out will represent an enormous and exciting opportunity for Iwatobi Aquarium. Our very first killer whale, coming to us from the coast of Wakayama Prefecture!”

Most of the crowd claps politely, but Haru notices Rin has his arms folded.

“We are also very lucky to have Matsuoka Rin, a senior trainer from Tokyo Ocean Encounters, here to supervise our efforts. He will be mentoring our very own Nanase Haruka, along with our vet staff, in state-of-the-art training and husbandry techniques. Could both of you come up here, please?”

At this, Rin's chest puffs up slightly and he takes Haru's hand, squeezing it before he lifts their arms up in a show of solidarity. Only Haru himself can feel the cling of his palm and the brief twining of his fingers with his as he releases his hand again. It makes his stomach clench as they take their places on either side of the director, who pats their backs proudly. The staff clap again (Nagisa whistles).

There is a clank from inside the crate, and the crane gives a mighty groan as it creaks into action. Immediately, Director Hazuki is motioning with both hands toward the medical pool. “All right, trainers, as we discussed! Team one with Matsuoka-san on the left, team two with Nanase-san. Your hardhats are by the med pool.”

There's a flurry of movement as the staff move into position, and Rin keeps trying to meet Haru's eyes while they put on their hardhats. He doesn't respond—what is he meant to respond to?—though he does nod politely to Ryugazaki, the vet, as he climbs down into the med pool beside him. Nagisa, on the other hand, simply throws his arms around the poor man by way of greeting.

“Stop that!” scolds Rin. “You need to stay focussed. Got it?”

This seems to earn him some admiration points from Nagisa's sisters, at least. Perhaps Ryugazaki, too, who looks ill at ease and only marginally happier once Nagisa's arms are not around his waist.

Haru stops watching them and focuses on the crane. It's in motion now, and over the blue rim of the crate, the hooks begin to emerge accompanied by a tall, black, fin.

The staff are strangely silent, now.

The whale emerges in a large, white sling, and none of them but Rin seem to grasp the sheer _size_ of the animal until it is lying in the shallow water before them, its great head jerking slowly from side to side as it makes sense of its surroundings. All of a sudden Haru's throat feels tight. It's the same sensation he felt when the pilot whales had died and the other staff had pulled them out onto the concrete, dry and lifeless; only this whale is not dead, and the only thing separating it from the water it belongs in is a single metal gate.

Ryugazaki moves past him, now and kneels carefully beside the animal's head to examine it. After a moment he stands up, nodding to them as he moves away. Nagisa and his sisters unhook the sling and lower it carefully into the water.

Rin takes charge again. “Okay. Everyone keep clear of the tail. Haru?”

“Yeah.”

The two of them kneel and, carefully, work the animal's flippers free of the sling. Rin's “watch out!” comes a moment too late, and Haru stumbles back briefly as the whale's head pulls toward him, jaws half-open. One of Nagisa's sisters—Nanami, he thinks—gasps in fright, but he barely even feels the tug of surprise in the bottom of his stomach. It's more like concern.

He stares the whale in its blue-green eye, and doesn't move as it closes its huge mouth and turns away again.

“You okay?” Rin still has his fearless-leader voice on, but Haru isn't fooled. He only nods as he gets to his feet, a single eye searing his mind.

 

* * *

 

Haru can't imagine swimming with this animal like he swims with Aiko and the others. It simply doesn't look like a creature he can be on equal terms with in the water. 'It' being 'he', actually. Ryugazaki Rei, the vet, says the whale is an adolescent bull, perhaps nine or ten years old. Rin says something about how it would be better if he were a bit younger for training. Director Hazuki suggests they can work with it. Haru tunes out and sits by the gate to the dolphin pool while the others talk, with Aiko spy-hopping beside him occasionally.

“'Neptune'.” Rin's voice dashes his efforts to stay disconnected. “Sucks for you.”

Haru stares silently in response, and Rin rolls his eyes.

“It's the whale's _name_ ,” he says, as if this ought to have been obvious, “and it's English, so you better brush up.”

“'Nepuchun',” Haru tries, reluctantly.

“'Nep-tune',” Rin repeats. Then he shakes his head. “C'mon, what's the matter with you? This is a big deal! Not many people get to work with a real killer whale.”

“No,” concedes Haru, still watching Aiko.

Behind him, he hears Rin huff before coming to sit next to him. “Who's this, then?”

“Aiko.” As she hears her name, Aiko bobs back down into the water and blows bubbles out of her blowhole. Rin snorts.

“Uh huh. You work with her a lot?”

Haru just nods and slaps the surface of the water with his palm, to which Aiko responds with a short, sharp tail-slap.

“She's pretty cute. I guess.” Rin, for all his denseness, seems to understand well enough. “You don't wanna leave her behind, right?”

He stays silent again.

“Well... sometimes you have to let go of things you care about.” Rin stands up again, arms folded. “Look, from what I hear you're the only trainer in this park good enough to deal with an orca. Just... take one for the team, okay? Once he's better-trained they can reassign some of the other dolphin trainers. I mean it's not...”

This time the silence is longer, and when Haru looks up he sees Rin's gaze casting out toward the whale floating in the show pool. He's staring through it, past it, into a place that Haru cannot fathom.

“You mean what?”

Rin blinks once, slowly, then turns his back. “Not like it's forever. You can still see Aiko and stuff, so don't be dumb about it.”

There is a hollowness about Rin that Haru doesn't recognise. Years ago when they argued about moving, when Rin pushed hard and he dug his heels in harder, there had been fire in his every word. Now it's not even embers or smoke; just cold, still air. He wants to ask him something, but when he parts his lips not even breath comes out.

Meanwhile, Rin changes the subject. “Let's just go feed him; he probably needs it. I'll show you how to work out the food portions.”

Haru takes another long look at Aiko. Then, slowly, he points her away and follows Rin down.

 

* * *

 

The whale is still floating silently by the time they get back with the fish, and though Haru almost goes to sit as he does when he feeds the dolphins, legs dangling in the water, Rin stops him with an arm across his chest. “Are you a fucking idiot? Do you know how fast he could take you down?”

“Down?”

“You've got to desensitize him to people being in the water. Otherwise he might think you're... I dunno, a toy or something.”

“I thought you said they were smart.” Haru gives him a critical look. Rin turns his gaze upward and appears to be praying for patience.

“Yeah, they are, but he hasn't been around people like this before. He's gonna be curious, and he's still a predator, so you can't test him just yet.”

“So what do I do?”

“Just...” Rin sets his buckets down, kneels, and slaps the surface of the water to get the whale's attention. “Give him some food and get him used to you.”

Neptune doesn't move. Rin slaps harder.

“Maybe he thinks you're rude,” Haru suggests.

“Fuck you, Haru.”

Haru sees the whale's dorsal fin ripple faintly, almost like it's shivering. He kneels down next to Rin and, while being splashed repeatedly for his efforts, guides his arm away from the water. “I want to try something.”

“Whatever.”

He bows down on all fours, lowers his face into the water, and blows bubbles like he does for the dolphins. When he sits back up again Rin is snapping something about how he _told_ him not to be so stupid, but—more importantly—the whale submerges, inch by inch, and comes to rest just a few metres away underwater.

“Now who's rude?” Rin laughs. “You totally said something offensive in orca just now.”

To their surprise, Neptune lifts his head and blows bubbles back before rising slowly to the surface again. Haru is caught off guard once again by the sheer size of the animal; he's simply never seen a living creature so big before. When he first started this job, even the dolphins seemed bigger than he'd expected, but they don't compare to Neptune at all in sheer mass.

Rin slides the bucket toward him, and he scoops out a mackerel, tossing it into the water in front of the animal's nose. Neptune lifts his head again and does... nothing.

“Huh.” Rin frowns, and Haru almost expects him to be annoyed. Instead, he sees him take another fish out of the bucket and hold it up to his mouth, pretending to eat it. “C'mon, Neptune. Are you hungry or not?”

The Rin Haru had known was never this openly dorky with animals... though when they were teenagers, he _had_ caught him baby-talking the stray cats who hung around the hilltop at times. Even so, Neptune still looks to be ignoring both fish, which float lifelessly in the water for a few more moments before starting to sink.

“Might just... take a while.” Rin sits, cross-legged, behind his bucket, turning another fish over in his hands. “He's probably just not used to eating dead fish, but he'll get the idea soon enough. Ours let you pour whole buckets into their mouths.”

An animal that eats more than ten times as much as a single dolphin is a bit of an intimidating prospect... which is assuming Neptune eats the fish at all. “What if he doesn't?”

Almost aggressively, Rin throws the fish he's been holding into the water. “He will. Just give it some time.”

 

* * *

 

By closing time, Neptune still hasn't eaten. He's barely even moved.

Nagisa suggests Haru cook him something a bit more appealing. Rin suggests that he shut the fuck up and proceeds to harrass the vet while Haru keeps sitting poolside, one hand in the fish bucket. Finally, Rin comes back to sit with him and hand him a clipboard with a blank piece of paper attached. “So, Doctor Dork over there can't really do any proper vet checks until he's been trained and desensed some more. You're just gonna have to observe.”

“I am observing,” says Haru, “he's right there.”

“You're so funny. The funniest person I know, actually.” Rin rolls his eyes. “Look, I think you should just stay over and... note respirations and anything out of the ordinary. I know it's a pain, but—”

“Okay.”

“Huh?”

“I do it all the time with the dolphins, it's fine.”

“O-oh, right. Dolphins. Yeah.” Rin stands up again slowly, rubbing the back of his neck. “So you don't... have anyone at home, or any plans or...?”

This earns a long, hard stare. “No.”

“Good. I mean... whatever.”

“You can stay at my house if you want.”

“What?!”

“I said you can stay at my house.”

“I can _afford_ a hotel, I don't need—” Rin sighs, running his hand down over his face. When he looks down at Haru again, he only seems more tired and hollow than he was before. “Really?”

“Mm.” Haru makes sure not to look at him. It doesn't matter if Rin sees his expression, but he doesn't need to see his. Rin was always a little too obvious about his emotions, and while today hasn't been exactly textbook, it's just... not worth riling up anything that should have been left out to dry a long time ago.

 _So,_ he thinks, _why did you say he could stay in your house?_

A long, shaky breath from Rin. “Well... if you're okay with it, then I guess so.”

“My key is in my locker beside my phone.”

Feet shuffling on the wet concrete. “Cool. So I can just...?”

“Yeah.”

Silence, meaning a steady effort to keep still. “You have my number, in case...?”

“Mm.”

Another slow exhale. “Okay. I'll see you, I guess.”

“Bye.”

 

* * *

 

At eleven o' clock, Ryugazaki comes down from the vet office to tell him he's leaving for the night. He brings Haru an orange and a soda from the vending machine, too, with the sort of thoughtfulness that still makes it clear he has no idea what his favourite flavours are.

He thinks about Rin, somewhere up in the hills, sleeping in one of his guest rooms. “Guest room” is actually just the term for rooms his family no longer use; Haru does consider, with a swallow, that Rin might not be sleeping in either of them. It's just as well he's here, then, sleepily watching a whale that barely moves, and gazing up at the clocktower that peeks up over the stadium roof to check the time every time the animal takes one of its loud, deep breaths.

Neptune inhales at 11:55:23 and goes under again, tucking himself into the corner of the tank near the dolphins' gate. _Maybe he's talking to them,_ thinks the fanciful part of Haru, but the cynical part of him supposes he might also be wishing he could eat them.

It would make sense if the reason Neptune wasn't eating the fish was that he was used to eating other marine mammals, like seals or smaller dolphins, which was a theory that Ryugazaki had also suggested... though obviously, they can't very well start feeding him _that._ If he can't be persuaded to eat fish, his options are minimal.

 _There's squid,_ Haru realises suddenly, and it seems stupid to not have thought of it until now; squid used to be one of the main foods in the pilot whales' diets back when they had them, but they still order it in small amounts for variation in the other animals' food plans. It won't hurt to try it, anyway.

Haru checks the clock again, then looks back down at his observations. It should be safe to duck into the food shed for a moment. Neptune has been pretty regular, taking a breath every 40 seconds or so with only a little variation, so Haru waits for the next breath, hastily writes it down, and slips out the back of the stadium through the trainer offices. As he passes through, he sees that someone has left a note on his locker, but doesn't pause to read it.

The lanky hands of the clock scrape around to midnight, and the tower's low chimes vibrate through the park. Haru returns to the stadium with a bucket of wobbling squid and steps into the shallow water on the slideout once again. Aside from the ripples around his own feet, the water is strangely still. No dark dorsal fin breaks its surface, and in fact...

Haru's heart jolts in his chest when he turns his head from left to right and notes the obvious: there is no whale in the pool at all.

_Where...?_

His head snaps illogically to the med-pool, where the crane had been only this morning. It's not there any more, and of course it would have been impossible to move it—and the whale—in the mere minutes he was gone. Neptune would be more than easy to find if he'd simply beached himself somehow, and the only other option is... impossible, surely.

But perhaps he _could_ have leapt over the gates separating the show pool from the dolphin tank. After all, Haru is no expert on the physical capacity of an orca whale, so who knows? Perhaps it's an absurd idea, but it's an absurd situation which only seems to be becoming exponentially more ridiculous. When he gets to the gate, he sees that the whole pod is gathered there with their beaks pointing toward the show pool, crowding one another to get a better view. Haru follows their gaze, and tenses abruptly.

A human body is half-floating at the bottom of the tank, metres from the gate. It's not moving; from here Haru can only see the top of the head and back, and the faint sway of limp limbs. There's no time to think or to change into his wetsuit. He breathes deeply, then leaps over the safety rail into a dive.

Under the water he can hear the dolphins vocalising frantically as he swims toward the body. It's a man, he can see now, naked and still as death. With the drag of his clothing he can't move as quickly as he'd like, but he gets his hands hooked under the other man's arms and jerks him upright, kicking hard until the two of them break the surface of the water. Haru breathes. He doesn't.

Their combined weight makes the relatively short distance to dry land seem painfully long, even with his years of swimming experience. Once they're there and he manages to push the stranger up onto the slideout, Haru is suddenly all-too-aware of how alone he is. There's no time to call for an ambulance; Rei has gone home, and even Rin will take too long to arrive.

The only person who can do anything is him.

He bows his head to the man's lips to feel for breath. Only the faintest shudder suggests anything of the sort, and Haru knows better than to wait. Carefully, he tilts back their head, pinches their nose and... has water coughed onto his face.

The man curls over onto his side, coughing hard, and Haru hesitates off to the side. Should he call the ambulance now? The police? His boss? Either way, his phone is back in his locker and he doesn't particularly want to leave a naked man just _lying_ here in cold water.

“Mum...”

Haru lifts his head at the sound of the stranger's voice, quiet in between coughs.

“Mum, I'm sorry. Mum—”

None of this is making sense, but Haru can't just sit here and watch. “Hey. You.”

The man goes still, then rolls over onto his back again. His eyes open for the first time, and Haru knows for sure that something is wrong; they're huge and blue-green, with only the faintest sliver of white at the edges, and before his very eyes the iris contracts, the blue being sucked into the pupil to leave only a pale, grassy green. He can't help but cover his mouth with his hand to keep from gasping.

“You're Neptune.”

“Wh-what?”

“You're... the whale.”

“I—” The man turns his face away, stares back into the water. “I don't... I don't know. I couldn't—my body was too weak, I couldn't...”

His mouth opens and closes clumsily, and Haru waits for him to find the words.

“I couldn't swim.” He rolls onto his side, face half-submerged. “My tail wasn't... couldn't see... never felt...”

He trails off again, and this time Haru's silence is less out of politeness and more out of sheer awe.

“...I couldn't swim.”

Very softly, he starts to cry, curled up on his side in the shallow water. Carefully, Haru places his hand on his shoulder and squeezes gently.

“I can swim,” he says, softly, and when Neptune looks up at him again it's as if he's seeing him for the first time.

“But...” He frowns, gazing up and down his body. “You don't have a tail.”

“I can swim,” he repeats. “And so can you.”

“No,” says Neptune tearfully, turning his face away again.

“Yes,” Haru insists. After a moment's thought, he adds, “But we'll freeze if we stay out here. Can you walk?”

Neptune seems embarrassed with his answer, but finally responds, innocently, “What's 'walk'?”

“Just hold on.”

After a bit of negotiation, the two of them manage to get Neptune's arm over the back of Haru's neck, and slowly, carefully, stand upright. He's a lot heavier than Haru can comfortably manage, and like the rescue from the pool, the journey to the trainer office is a lot slower than he'd expected. Once they're there, he gets out a pair of towels and starts drying himself off, only to turn around and see Neptune sitting there on one of the benches, shivering, with his towel draped over one knee.

“Oh. Here.” A little uncomfortably, he goes to stand in front of him and rub his body dry with the towel. There isn't as much shame about it as there perhaps should be, and this is largely because Neptune doesn't seem to notice or care that he's naked. It would be more awkward if he felt embarrassed, so Haru's just glad he isn't making a big deal.

“Thank you,” he says quietly, when Haru finishes and drapes the towel around his neck again to catch the moisture from his hair.

“Are you cold?” Haru asks him, and he nods meekly. There's not much in the way of clothing here that he can give him, but there's bedding in one of the cupboards for overnight stays, and so he ends up having to wrap a blanket around him and call it good. Once again, he thinks about calling Rin for advice... but what would he ask him? 'Have any of your whales ever turned into a person before?' It's too late for something like that; he'll just think he's still dreaming.

Neptune is staring down at his lap, and Haru realises with a twist of guilt that he's probably much more confused than he is. He's unlucky, then, that the person on watch was Haru and not Nagisa; the latter might have already cheered him up with jokes or affection but Haru is only really good at a few things, and none of them involve comforting people.

“Sorry,” he mumbles.

“It's not your fault,” Neptune replies gently. “You're doing all you can.”

 _I am,_ Haru thinks, almost shocked by the insight, but simply nods mutely in response. The two of them sit in silence for quite some time, seated on the bench with half a metre between them. The office clock sits across from them, ticking softly. Haru sees the other man watching it thoughtfully.

“What does 'Neptune' mean?” he asks suddenly.

Haru hesitates. “It's a name.”

“Whose name?”

“Your name,” he tells him, though it sounds terribly stupid all of a sudden.

“But that isn't my name. Who told you it was?”

Haru doesn't have an answer to that. “What is it, then?”

“Makoto.” He pauses after that and touches his lips, as if they've startled him. “Only... normally it doesn't sound like that.”

“I'm Nanase Haruka.” He shrugs a little. “Just Haru is okay.”

Makoto doesn't say anything, but leans to the side and slowly drags his shoulder against his. Haru blinks, but doesn't withdraw. “Okay.”

The ticking of the clock fills another silence, and Haru notices it enough to check the time again. It's quarter to one in the morning now, and strangely all he can think about is how he's forgotten to count the respirations. Almost curiously, he glances over at Makoto again. His breathing is slow and deep, but he's very still. _Are you real?_ Haruka wonders. He watches him until he seems to blur at the edges.

“I need to ask you something,” he says.

“Yes?”

Haruka asks him. Slowly. Carefully. Makoto hesitates, then gives his answer.

The world, unbeknownst to them, begins to change.

 


	3. Rin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for your feedback overnight! I'm so excited to share this story with you.  
> The fic will alternate mostly between the perspectives of Rin and Haru, with few exceptions (like the prologue), so... please enjoy the first Rin chapter! I love Rin very much but I've probably bullied him too much in this, haha :(
> 
>  **A short quote today, with a list of injuries caused to former Seaworld killer whale trainer, John Hargrove, during his career:**  
>  "...daily pain caused from multiple back and neck injuries, major cartilage destruction to both knees, broken fingers, toes and ribs..."

The house on the hill is just like Rin remembers it. It's a relief to come back to the place he grew up and find just one thing the same as ever; innocence is hard to come by, these days.

After he'd moved to Tokyo and Gou had followed a few years later to start her degree, their mother had finally made the decision to sell their house in Iwatobi and follow them. Since then they'd returned only rarely to pay their respects to their father, and Rin hadn't thought it appropriate to contact any of his old friends while they were there. He'd been conflicted about taking this approach with Haru for a time, but as the years had passed and there had been no phone call, no email, no letter, he'd told himself that he'd made the right decision. He didn't always believe it, of course.

Inside the house, not much has changed either. The only difference Rin notes in the living room at least is a fan he doesn't recognise and that's about it. It even smells the same; the ocean air filters faintly in through the windows, along with the plants from the garden and something else underneath all of that, unique to Haru himself.

Rin had known when he came here that his visit could be months long, so his suitcase is packed to the brim in spite of containing only essentials. Gou had teased him while he was packing about how he'd get frustrated wearing the same thing over and over, to which he'd retorted that he was sure he could still figure out where to buy clothes, no matter how long he'd been away. She'd found that funny for some stupid reason. Girls were so weird.

Then again, everyone's weird these days. The only person who doesn't seem to have gone weird since he left is Nagisa, who was weird to start with. Rin isn't sure what it was he expected from returning to Iwatobi, even in this context. Perhaps, if not a fresh start, a brief return to the simple peace of his childhood. Maybe that was why he had been so eager to pack his bags and get on the train at so little notice.

His knees are aching. He takes a bath and they're a little better. He reads a text message from his old roommate (“I heard you were in town; let's catch up”) and doesn't reply to it. He sets his laptop up to charge in the living room. He stands in the kitchen and opens the fridge, and closes the fridge, and opens the fridge and closes it.

He thinks about the note he left on Haru's locker: “Call if you need me. Good night.” It had been harder than he'd thought to write two simple sentences on a piece of paper. Was it enough? There is so much more he needs to tell Haru—that much is clear—but when and where and how is not so easy to decide.

Alone on the train it had been easy to think about what he would say when he arrived; what he'd tell him about how they'd left things and how he hoped things would be now. Then he'd seen him and it hadn't mattered what he'd planned any more. All of it felt pointless. Maybe it is pointless.

He takes his bag upstairs and sets it down in one of the bedrooms. This is the room where Haruka's parents used to sleep when they lived here, and sometimes they still use it when they visit. He sits on the foot of the bed and checks his phone again. No message from Haru, but Nagisa has sent a message now asking if he is busy (along with an emoticon that looks like far too much effort to key in). He ignores it for a few minutes, then replies with a vague “yes”. Nagisa sends a few more messages that Rin doesn't pay a lot of attention to. The sun is setting pink and orange, and he lies down his side, imagining it melting into the sea.

He doesn't realise he's fallen asleep until he wakes up suddenly, still dressed and lying on top of the covers. His clothes are all clammy, his mouth is dry, and it takes him a while to sit upright again and rub his head.

_This is stupid,_ he thinks,  _what are you doing with yourself?_

( _All you really can do, now,_ seems to be the blunt reply.)

Rin makes himself stand up and change into his pyjamas. Just as he's about to climb back into bed properly, his eyes land on the half-open door. Just across from him is Haru's empty room.

He shouldn't, but he does. Curiosity is scratching on that door and gnawing at the handle, and soon he crosses the landing to let it in, flipping the light switch and shielding his eyes until they adjust to the brightness.

When he opens them again he starts to feel like he must still be asleep. There's a poster on the wall that's been there since elementary school, and even some of the titles peering out from the small bookshelf are familiar. But most striking to the Rin are the things Haru has kept from  _their_ time together: the pod of at least five stuffed dolphins he bought for him at stores or won for him in festival games, smiling from the shelf above the desk, accompanied by a single, very unhappy-looking felt octopus; the card he'd made for their last White Day, agonising over the uneven edges; the photo of them in their school uniforms, Haru's head flopping easily onto his shoulder. He's not smiling though. Haru never smiled in photos, even with him.

His chest hurts. Seeing Haru himself was enough, but this? This is evidence that what they had didn't just slip silently beneath the water without even attempting a final gasp of breath; it isn't something that can be simply thrown away or packed into boxes in the last ten years. He's thought for so long that Haru didn't understand that like he did, but... he must. He has to. Otherwise, Rin's heart is aching over nothing. Otherwise, Rin is just standing in his room in the middle of the night like a creep. Otherwise, everything really has changed.

 

* * *

 

 

There are no signs of Haru having been home when Rin wakes up the next morning, so he makes himself eat some toast and heads down to the aquarium first thing. He's still accustomed to rising early, so the park isn't open when he arrives and he has to stand by the gates like a loser until Nagisa responds to his text message.

It ends up being one of Nagisa's sisters, whose name Rin can't remember, who finally comes to unlock the gate and say something about getting him a proper keycard. About five seconds later, Nagisa comes barrelling down from the stadium and practically plows into him, hugging Rin against his wet chest and looking up at him with wide, thrilled eyes.

“Rin-chan, come look! It's the coolest thing I've ever seen!”

Rin doesn't get a chance to say anything before the shorter man seizes him by the wrist and all but drags him up to the stadium. From across the show pool, he can see Haru sitting cross-legged in the shallow water. The whale, rolled onto his side next to him, bows underwater then surges up onto the slide-out between Haru and dry land.

His heart seems to stop. Rin's seen it, he's felt it; these animals are gentle and intelligent, but they're also powerful beyond what a human can imagine. They can hurt without thinking, and when they _are_ thinking even the most experienced trainers can't do much about it. Nothing truly awful has ever happened at his park, but he's heard things, he knows things... and this whale hasn't even been desensed.

Instinctively, Rin runs. He knows there would be nothing he could do. Once Haru was in the water, the animal would have all the power.

He vaults over a couple of barriers and jars his knee, but he doesn't stop until he's close enough to climb up onto the stage. Haru's only a few metres away, now, kneeling next to the whale's flipper.

“What are you doing?” Rin asks, as quietly and calmly as he can. The last thing he wants to do is agitate the animal. Or his idiot trainer, he supposes. A jolt runs through him when Haru looks up and meets his eyes. He seems almost mystified by something, and Rin actually looks behind him for a second to see if there's someone else there. Then he collects himself, clearing his throat. “What's going on? Where's your spotter?”

“Nagisa just left. Ryugazaki is over there.” He points over the animal's tail and Rin sees the vet for the first time, sitting in one of the benches side-of-stage. He honestly hadn't noticed him until now.

“Great. Fine. Get off the slideout. Slowly. I'm sure you know what a stupid thing you're doing right now, so stop it.”

Haru opens his mouth like he wants to say something, then thinks better and closes it. _Damn right,_ thinks Rin, and holds out his arm for Haru to take. In response, Haru holds his hand up in a 'wait' gesture. Rin wishes he could just pull him up, swing him over his shoulder and walk him out of the stupid stadium before he does something even dumber.

“I have to go,” he's saying to the whale. “Can I get up?”

Neptune's head slides toward Haru, swinging between the two of them. Rin tenses.

“It's okay. I'm coming back soon. Stay still.” The whale exhales softly, almost like a sigh, but does as he's told, letting Haru lay his hand on its head as he stands up and moves around it, stepping back up onto the stage. “Thank you, Makoto.”

Neptune whistles softly and, when Haru points back toward the pool, slides easily back into the water. By this point Nagisa has rejoined them, and makes himself known by slinging his arm around Rin's shoulder.

“I told you it was cool! Isn't Haru-chan amazing?”

“It's pretty impressive,” Rin confesses through gritted teeth, “but that was a _stupid_ risk to take with an untrained animal. They'd fire you for shit like that in my park.”

“I didn't get hurt,” Haru says simply.

“Even if you _didn't_ , it doesn't matter! I don't care how confident you are, you're not working with dolphins any more. Those are _apex predators_ , Haru, you can't just treat them like any other animal in the facility!”

“Matsuoka-san, there's no need to panic.” Doctor Ryugazaki has made his way up onto the stage as well, now, and pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “We've watched Nanase-san with the whale all morning, and there's been no cause for concern. It's a complete transformation from yesterday; he's already vocalising, displaying energy and eating plenty. As unscientific as it sounds I—”

Rin shrugs Nagisa off his shoulder and rounds on the vet.

“Okay,” he says, voice low. “Okay, fine. Have you worked with orca before, Doctor?”

“I've... performed an autopsy on—”

“A _real_ orca!” Rin gestures angrily to the pool. “None of you understand! You hear that they're smart, and you assume that means they think the same way we do. You think that their sense of right and wrong is just like ours... well, it's not! I have seen these whales _hurt people_. Sometimes it's not their fault, it's never anyone's _fault_ but—but what I'm trying to say is that you can't afford to fuck around. People get hurt all the time in this profession. Good trainers know that! Good trainers aren't _reckless_!”

“Rin,” says Haru, softly, “trust me.”

“No! You don't know what you're talking about. Just—just stick with me from now on. Don't even go near the pool without me, you total fucking _idiot_.”

Nagisa puts his hand on his shoulder again. “Rin-chan, everything's fine, so maybe you're—”

“Don't 'Rin-chan' me!” he snaps, slapping his hand away and storming off into the trainer office. He can't look at any of them any more; his blood is boiling and his hands are shaking and, inexplicably, he feels like he's going to cry.

At his own park, they would definitely have disciplined Haru. It was a huge safety violation considering the whale's training—or lack thereof—so he'd been in the right, hadn't he? Only at his own park he's never panicked so much over another trainer's safety. He's always been able to keep his head in these sorts of situations, but...

But it was Haru. Seeing him again seems to have brought more repressed emotion boiling out of his heart than he ever knew was there. Of course it would be now, when he needs stability more than anything else, that he loses the ability to control how he feels.

He hears the office door open again and wipes his hot, dry eyes. He knows it's Haru from the silence; Nagisa would have burst out with something stupid straight away and anyone else would have at least announced themselves.

“What,” he says, as coldly as he can.

“I'm sorry for scaring you.”

A sincere apology from Haru is about as common as a smiling child in a dentist's office; if reluctantly, Rin turns to face him again. “Yeah?”

“Didn't realise it was bad.” He's not looking at him. Rin frowns.

“You've been working with dolphins for years. I mean, I know I said—but they are kind of similar. Not always predictable and stuff.” He tilts his head to try and get a better vantage on Haru's face. “I thought you knew that. It's not like you to make sloppy mistakes.”

“It wasn't a mistake,” says Haru, quietly, “Makoto is different.”

It takes Rin a moment to connect things in his mind. “Wait—you mean the whale? His name is _Neptune_.”

“No, it's Makoto.”

Rin groans. “Haru, you can't just call him something else because you can't pronounce his real name.”

“It is his real name,” Haru insists.

“No, Haru, you don't get to do that.” He rolls his eyes. “And even if you did, why would you give him a girly name?”

“ _You_ have a girly name.”

“Wh—hey, shut up, so do you!” He sees Haru smile, just thinly, and he realises that he's already relaxed. It's stupid that another person can affect him so easily, but really he's just glad that nothing bad happened. “If you want me to help you with your English, you can just ask.”

Haru turns his head away.

“Okay, I guess not.” Rin breathes out slowly, and starts unbuttoning his shirt to change into his wetsuit. “Wait for me to suit up, and we'll go back out. I mean—”

He hesitates for so long that even Haru eventually asks, “What?”

“I mean... it's...” He sighs. “It's good. That he likes you. I mean, obviously we always get better results with animals we have a bond with. You know that from dolphins, I guess.”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah.” He unbuckles his belt. “So, you just gonna stand there and watch me get naked?”

A pause. “Does it matter?”

“Guess not.” Rin huffs, then grins at him over his shoulder. “Pervert.”

“I've seen Nagisa naked,” Haru puts in, straight-faced.

“Okay, okay, fine.”

“I've seen Nagisa's sisters naked,” he continues.

“Geez, chill out! I don't need to know about your awkward locker room moments with the Hazuki family.”

“It's not awkward,” says Haru. Then, slowly, as if he's not sure whether to say it or not; “I've seen Makoto naked.”

Rin stops with his legskins halfway up his thighs. “ _Neptune_ is a _whale_. He's always naked.”

“Hm,” says Haru, and averts his eyes until Rin is dressed again.

 

* * *

 

 

Rin has to admit that whatever is going on with Haru and the whale isn't like anything he's ever seen. When they start desensing, Neptune goes to Haru no matter if he's the active trainer or the one providing distraction. He does seem _interested_ in Rin, but infinitely more uncomfortable around him.

Weird as it is, Rin isn't completely surprised. Haru always did have the uncanny ability to attract others, human and animal alike. When they were younger cats used to follow him home, girls were always falling in love with him and even teachers seemed a little flustered by the quiet boy who sat staring out the window in the backs of their classes. He hadn't been surprised at all to hear from Gou, still living in Iwatobi after Rin had left for the city, that Haru was a natural talent with the animals from the moment he started at the aquarium.

This isn't the sort of profession where one can rely on natural talent for too long, however. Accidents are to be expected; not as some grave, distant inevitability, but as an ordinary part of life. He just worries that the staff here don't understand this as well as they should. From what he understood in his phone interview, none of the staff here have ever worked with orca before. It might be a while before reality sinks in.

Surely it isn't like Haru to get carried away so quickly. Even now, he's down at the pool with the vet, trying to take a blowhole culture before they break for lunch. Rin reluctantly leaves them to it, pulling his polarfleece on over his mostly-dry suit and heading down to meet Nagisa at _Rockhopper's_ , the decidedly tacky restaurant built to face the whale and dolphin stadium.

He can't see him from the stadium doors though; the only person near the restaurant is some idiot tourist taking pictures of the signs.

Nagisa must have already gone inside. Rin is just going in to look for him, when the man with the camera takes him by the arm, easily turns him around and exclaims “smile!” before quickly snapping his picture.

_It's a guest,_ Rin tells himself,  _you can't punch a guest._

“Uh,” he says, filtering through his mind for the most polite phrasing of 'go fuck yourself' possible. Then the man lowers his camera, gasps, and immediately bows in way of apology. “I'm so sorry! Rin-senpai, I thought you'd recognise me!”

“ _Nitori_?!”

Ten years have been good to Nitori Aiichirou, apparently; he's gone from a slightly dorky looking teenager with a bowl cut to... well, a slightly dorky looking adult. He still has a faintly childish face, but at least he seems to have had the sense to let his grey hair grow out into more of a bob. He hasn't gotten much taller, and he doesn't look quite as fit as he was in high school, but now that Rin gets a proper look at him there's no mistaking his identity.

“Sorry,” he repeats, and lifts up his camera again, “I'll delete it if you want me to.”

“Eh, whatever.” Rin shrugs. “Just surprised me, that's all.”

That out of the way, Nitori hooks his camera strap back around his neck and grabs both of Rin's hands in his. “It's so nice to see you! When I heard you'd arrived—”

Rin frowns. “How'd you know?”

“Oh, my ex works here,” says Nitori vaguely, then continues: “I haven't seen you in years! I'm supposed to do a story here about the orca anyway, so I hoped I would catch you. Are you busy? Since you got here the same day as the whale, I thought you would have a lot of responsibilities and probably be tired from travelling, too. I have this remedy that—”

“Uh...”

“Sorry, sorry! You probably are busy.” Nitori smiles sheepishly. “I-I could come back later, or another day even. I'd really like to catch up some time, but if you don't want to, then—”

“No, it's fine.” Rin sighs. “I'm on my lunch break right now, but I was supposed to meet Nagisa.”

“Oh, him? He was here earlier, but I think he's gone now.”

“Huh.” Rin pulls his cellphone out of his pocket. “I guess I should see where he went.”

Nitori nods and just watches him, tapping the sides of his camera with his index fingers. “Your number is still the same, isn't it? I sent you a message but you didn't reply.”

“Oh, yeah. Sorry, I was... kind of busy yesterday.”

“Of course, of course! Sorry.” He smiles.

Rin wants to say he hasn't changed a bit, but after that initial burst of effrontrey it's clear that he has. He's similar, yes, but with certainty and self-possession he'd never had as a kid, tripping all over himself to hand him his towel or water bottle. Life really has gone on without him in Iwatobi.

“So what're you up to now?” Rin looks him up and down quickly. “I guess you're not swimming any more.”

“Well, I was never much good,” laughs Nitori, but he takes up his camera again in both hands. “I'm a journalist, now. Usually I cover sports, but I told them I had connections here so they gave me the whale story.”

“You mean the Hazukis? I didn't know you and Nagisa were friends.”

“Oh... we're not, really.” Nitori's lip twitches a bit. “Er, actually, it's—”

“Rin-chan! I got your message!”

Nagisa never did know how to make a quiet entrance; he and his sister have arrived with no less than three penguins scuttling along after them on the footpath on brightly coloured leashes. Even Rin has to smile a bit at that. “Yeah? I thought you weren't coming.”

“I was, but Shione needed some help. _Rockhopper's_ Hoppy Happy Hour is a serious matter, Rin-chan, even though it's only ten minutes long!” he declares, hopping bird-like from one foot to the other while the penguins waddle closer and stand expectantly by his feet. He takes some crab meat out of his waistpack and sprinkles it on the ground, and they swarm it immediately.

“It was his idea,” says Shione in a somewhat defeated tone.

Rin rolls his eyes. “Of course it was.”

“Ai-chan! I didn't realise you were there!” The usual brightness of Nagisa's voice suddenly seems a little glaring. Rin turns his gaze to Nitori and sees him forcing a thin smile as Nagisa hugs him.

“Nagisa-san. Hello.” He looks over Nagisa's shoulder at Shione. “Shione-san, nice to see you.”

“Hey.” She smiles back, then helpfully pulls her brother back by his shoulder. “Come on, Nagisa, we have to hit the picnic area.”

“Right! I'm sorry, Rin-chan! Wait here for a bit, okay?”

“Whatever,” replies Rin.

“Bye, Ai-chan!”

Shockingly, he actually thinks he sees Nagisa  _scowling_ before he disappears around the back of the restaurant, which is singularly one of the weirdest things he's ever seen. Nitori has the grace not to notice, or at least pretend he doesn't. 

“Were you going to get lunch?” he asks politely, pointing into the restaurant.

“Sure,” says Rin, “why not?”

In the end, Nagisa only pops his head in briefly to tell Rin that he's going back to the dolphins and leaves the two of them alone. Nitori, meanwhile, gets shy Nanami to giggle and pose in front of the food cabinet for him in her apron and penguin-themed visor.

“Is that her?” asks Rin, when Nitori sits back down and turns off his camera.

“Huh?”

“Nagisa's sister. Is that your ex?”

“What? No!” Nitori laughs. “No, no, no. Rin-senpai, that's silly.”

“I dunno, she looked pretty happy to pose for you.” Rin leans back in his chair, arms folded. “Maybe you should go for it.”

“I don't want to upset Nagisa-san,” says Nitori. Then he curls his lip a little bit and adds, “more.”

“Why would he be upset?”

“You were upset when you thought someone was dating _your_ sister,” points out Nitori, and Rin bristles immediately.

“Th-that's different! Gou's my _little_ sister. Nagisa's sisters are all older.”

“Well...” Nitori smiles thinly and gazes back over at the counter, where Nanami is serving a family of four. “She can probably do better. Anyway, I don't date any more.”

“Neither, I guess.” Rin leans forward, elbows on the table either side of his orange juice. Honestly, he hasn't even thought about dating since he was eighteen and Haru had called it off. At first he'd thought he'd change his mind. Then he'd thought they could try again when they were older. Now he isn't really sure what he thinks, let alone what _Haru_ thinks.

“How long were you and Nanase-san together?” asks Nitori suddenly.

“Uh. Three years. And two months.” Nitori cocks his head a little, and he quickly corrects. “Or, uh, something like that. I don't really remember.”

“Mm.” Nitori smiles. “That's a while. I don't think I've ever been with someone that long. Is he the only—”

“Yes,” says Rin, quickly. It doesn't matter what Nitori was going to say; Haru is still 'the only' everything. “Just... I don't want to talk about it. Right now.”

Taking the hint, Nitori starts fiddling with his camera again, apparently—from his quiet, but nonetheless perfectly audible running commentary—deleting some of the reject photos of the day. Rin stares down at his lap, running his hands over his knees. They don't hurt today. At least, not yet. It's usually some time after lunch that the dull ache starts to set in, so he'll have to be more careful this afternoon. He doesn't want to have to put his pateller supports on. He was a potential Olympiate once, for fuck's sake, he doesn't _need_ to walk around covered in bandages.

“Rin-senpai,” he hears Nitori say, and it seems like he might have already said it once or twice. “Nanase-san is outside.”

“He—what?” Rin turns his head. It doesn't look like Haru's noticed him yet, but he still sits up a little straighter. “Oh. Right. Then I guess I should—”

“I have to go, too,” Nitori admits, “I probably shouldn't have stayed this long.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

“No! I'm glad I saw you again. You look great.” Rin doesn't _feel_ great, but he smiles. “Take care.”

Nitori stands up to leave, and Rin follows suit. Nitori wraps his arms around him loosely, and Rin... lets his arms hang at his sides. Then, just as he feels his grip slackening, he hooks one arm around his shoulders and presses him briefly to his chest.

“Nice to see you,” he says, awkwardly, “good luck with your story.”

“Actually,” says Nitori innocently, blue eyes looking wider by the moment, “I had sort of hoped I could get a picture of the whale, but the stadium's closed... i-if it's not allowed, I understand, but...”

“Oh, right...” Rin rubs the back of his neck. “Uh... look, I'll ask Haru. I'm sure it's okay, since you're press and stuff... and it's not like the publicity would be bad.”

“Of course not!”

“But, uh... not right now, okay? We've got a dolphin show this afternoon, so we've got to move the whale and...”—measure food, persuade a 5-meter animal into a tiny medical pool, try to take a blood sample at some point—“...do... stuff.”

Nitori smiles. “Right. I have to do stuff too.”

“Cool. Go... do stuff then.”

“All right. I will. Good luck with your stuff, Rin-senpai.”

“My stuff is... is sorted.”

“Of course it is.”

“You bet.”

Nitori finishes gathering up his things, and lifts his hand to his ear in a telephone gesture as he heads for the door.

“Call me,” he laughs, “when you're done with your _stuff_.”

 

* * *

 

 

When they get back to the stadium, Haru breaks away from him and makes a beeline for the dolphin pool. The orca follows him to the gate almost immediately, watching him as he crouches down and splashes the water, calling the pod over. Rin just leans against the front of the trainer's office to watch him. It's kind of nice seeing Haru look so at home, and if the dolphins weren't being so loud he'd almost think he could hear him laughing.

But he seems to slow down once he stands up and goes over to watch the orca. Rin supposes it isn't entirely unusual; the first time he even _saw_ an orca up close he almost stopped breathing. The first time he touched one skin to skin his heart had jolted, and the first time he'd swam in the water with one was simply indescribable. Even watching from the side of the pool, he had never imagined such a huge animal could be so fast and so graceful.

Haru reaches out his hand very slowly and Neptune leans up into it. Rin can't help but feel a strange prickle on the back of his neck, and has to break the moment with his voice, “Haru, will you be able to move him? I'll get someone to help us with the nets.”

“I think it's all right,” says Haru, and his voice seems a little distant. He gives Neptune a hand target and the animal, surprisingly, responds. Then he stands up and moves slowly around the edge of the pool with the whale following. Rin goes with them, briefly brushing his hand along Haru's back as he passes him to get to the gate and open it.

“You're doing the dolphin show today, right?” he asks over the grinding of the metal bars, but Neptune goes rigid and wails piercingly and Haru's attention is off him instantly. Rin, too, turns toward the whale anxiously. He can see Haru's knees bending, as if preparing for a dive. “Haru, don't you dare!”

“I won't,” Haru says without looking at him, and kneels down next to the water again, splashing the surface to get Neptune's attention. “Makoto. Makoto, stay there. Don't worry.”

_Where did he get that stupid name?_ Rin wonders a little crossly, but Neptune seems to be responding to Haru's voice, so whatever works. “We can still get the nets.”

“I can do it.” Haru insists, climbing over the barriers to the med pool. Yesterday said pool had been mostly drained to make it safer for all the trainers to be in the water with the animal, but by now it's been refilled to its usual depth of seven feet or so. Haru kneels on the ledge and calls the whale by its wrong name. The huge animal gingerly moves through the metal gates and comes closer to him, lifting his head out of the water and pressing it between Haru's knees.

He's glad the nets weren't necessary. But... “Haru, bring him around a bit. The gate'll close on his tail this way.”

Haru nods and moves down to the corner of the ledge, prompting Neptune to move onto a diagonal. The whale shudders when the gate closes again, but presses its huge head closer to Haru's stomach and lets him rub it.

“What a baby,” teases Rin gently, laughing at the sight of such an enormous creature trying to hide its face in Haru's wetsuit.

Haru glares at him suddenly, harshly. Then Nagisa's voice calls him from over towards the show pool, and he reluctantly stands.

“Hey,” says Rin, awkwardly, “I'm sorry. I didn't mean to—what's the matter?”

“Nothing,” Haru replies, seeming oddly sheepish about it. Then, “Will you watch him for me?”

“Yeah, of course.”

Haru slips past him without another word, and as the show music fills the stadium and the dolphin trainers take the stage Rin tears his gaze away and looks down at the whale. He's floating very still now, head still pressed into the corner where Haru once sat. Rin watches his fin and frowns. It's still straight; most of the males have fins that at least lean slightly to one side, and in fact he's sure that he saw the tip starting to sag as early as yesterday as he'd been lowered into the med pool.

In the show pool, things are starting to get underway. Rin keeps looking down at Neptune thoughtfully. He'd like to get closer to the whale, but without a spotter it's probably not worth the risk, particularly during a show. Neptune looks calm enough in any case, though he does roll over onto his side at one point and gnaw lazily on the ledge he's laying his head on. Just as he's doing this, Dr. Ryugazaki sidles up next to Rin.

“Hello,” he says, almost nervously.

“Yo,” Rin replies without looking at him.

Ryugazaki clears his throat. “Matsuoka-san... I wanted to talk to you about this morning, if that's all right. Are you busy?”

“Nah. Just hanging out with this guy.” He jerks his head toward the whale, then stands up from where he's been leaning against the gate and walks around to the spotter's bench where the two of them sit down.

“Does he say much?” asks Ryugazaki, and it takes Rin a second to realise he's just trying to be friendly and not _seriously_ asking something so dumb.

“Only to Haru,” he tells him, laughing. “Looks like he really likes that guy.”

“Nanase-san is pretty incredible,” confesses the vet, gazing over into the show pool, where Haru is flanked by Nagisa and Maiha, whose name Rin is only able to remember now because he recognises Nanami and Shione from earlier today. The dolphins in front of them are tailwalking, jerking comically around the pool while the audience laughs and cheers. “But... I should have listened to you this morning.”

Rin blinks. “Huh?”

“Well, the reason you're here is that you know what you're doing. And you're right... most of us have never even seen a killer whale, let alone trained one. We should have been a lot more careful. I'm sorry.”

For some reason the sincerity of his apology makes Rin a little sheepish, and he fidgets in his seat. “I... look, nobody got hurt, so I guess it's fine. Just... shouldn't get too complacent or anything.”

“No, of course not. That's...” The vet rubs the back of his neck. “That's why I came over, too. I thought you might need a spotter.”

“Oh. Thanks, Doctor.”

“I'll be learning from you just like Nanase-san, so you don't have to be so respectful. You can use my first name if you want to.”

Rin recalls, a little guiltily, referring to him as 'Doctor Dork' without a hint of irony. “Uh... I don't know your first name.”

“It's Rei.” He smiles, and holds out his hand to shake.

Rin considers, then takes it firmly. “Yeah, okay. I'm going to get down there with Neptune now. Keep an eye out.”

“I will.”

As he lowers himself onto the ledge, the whale's head lifts and it turns toward him, having to curve its tail slightly sideways to do so. The med pool needs to be expanded, but Rin knows there hasn't been time yet. Killer whales from Japanese captures are often transported quickly by necessity; few facilities are able to store such large animals at short notice.

They do their best, Rin knows it. Why wouldn't they? Nobody _wants_ the animals to suffer; it's just inevitable for a little while, until they're used to their surroundings.

“Hey, big guy,” he mutters, since he doesn't particularly want Ryugazaki to catch him being a softy. “You okay down here?”

Neptune tilts his head slightly to stare at him as Rin kneels down next to his head.

“Yeah, I know it's kind of small. But they're working on a habitat for you right now, and it's going to be awesome.” He reaches out, slowly, and touches the whale's rostrum. “I'm going to teach Haru everything I know. You and him are going to swim together like he does with Aiko, over there.”

He points at the show pool, where Haru and his favourite dolphin are swimming on their backs, hand in fin, while soft English music plays over the speakers. Rin smiles a little. It doesn't matter where you go; every goddamn dolphin show is going to sneak in 'You Raise Me Up' as much as possible. It's lost on Haru, of course, who probably doesn't even understand the lyrics.

Neptune rolls over onto his side and gazes up at him. He seems for all the world to be listening.

Rin pats him firmly just over his eyepatch.

“Don't worry, buddy. We'll make sure you have it good.”

He gazes down to the animals tail flukes, half-curled over on the pool floor, then back up at his huge head, laying tiredly on the ledge. The whale's eyes close, and he exhales from his blowhole in a slow huff.

_Or we'll try,_ Rin thinks, with his stomach clenching like a fist, slowly squeezing shut on something frail and helpless.

 


	4. Haruka

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just as everyone assures Haruka things will start going right, everything goes wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all your kudos/bookmarks/etc.! Sorry that updates take a little while. I do a lot of fact-checking and research in between, so sometimes I have to stop myself from being so pedantic. This chapter is like, really stressful. So I'm sure that you guys are all chill and excited about season 2 and so am I but for now I just gotta kill the buzz. I'm sorry. xD  
> There is a lot of stuff in this story that I have ~hidden from you so far but I promise soon I will be more blatant about precisely what is going on with Makoto. It is difficult to keep that balance where you give the audience just the right amount of information without going overboard on the exposition so I made up my mind to be as stingy I can for as long as I can... buuut rest assured I somewhat know where I'm going with this, so don't panic. P:  
> Re: ships: I still intend to fake you out as much as possible because literally all of them are equally important but if you really want to favour one over the other you can if you want, I guess. It's not the important part. xD
> 
>  **A quote from Ric O'Barry, former "Flipper" trainer and founder of The Dolphin Project.**  
>  "A dolphin's smile is the greatest deception. It creates the illusion that they're always happy."

 

He blows the whistle long and slow and Aiko whistles back. He blows again, shorter this time, and again she mimics the length and pitch. Further up on the stage, Nagisa gives the audience a dubious dose of education.

“Dolphins are some of the most intelligent animals on the planet,” he's saying.

“Some of them are probably smarter than you,” says his sister Maiha, standing next to him. He laughs very naturally; Nagisa might have performed this show script hundreds of times but he always manages to sound appropriately surprised by Maiha's line, shooting back, quickly.

“Well, we don't quite know how smart they are yet, so maybe, maybe not. Can you tell us, Haru?”

Haru makes sure to visibly shake his head. He rarely has lines in these shows; he's more valuable in the water, not talking or controlling the show from the stage.

“Looks like we'll never know, then.”

Aiko bobs down slightly in the water, and Haru reaches down, rubbing her sides just above her flippers. She turns slightly to look up at him better, and her eyes are faintly vacant. Maybe she's bored of the show for now; it wouldn't be the first time, but this doesn't happen often when he's in the water with her. Strange as it sounds, sometimes his presence seems to be more motivating to her than fish when it comes to performing.

Concerned, he bows his head and touches it to her beak, drawing a few sighs and coos from the audience. In the back of his mind he wishes he could empty the stalls. Right now he wants to concentrate on Aiko, but with the sounds of the music and the crowd filling the stadium, and Neptune—no, Makoto's—back half-visible over the med pool gates, it seems impossible.

Nagisa blows his whistle and the other dolphins break from the stage to begin the show's next segment, but Aiko doesn't move, instead rolling over onto her side and staring up at him, opening her beak as if to beg for fish. Then she sinks down a little again, and closes her mouth on empty water. As the rest of the pod begins its series of leaps and breaches (with a glaring gap in the formation where Aiko would usually swim), Haru looks up in time to see Nagisa watching him out of the corner of his eye. He's still beaming wide enough that half the audience can count his teeth, but his eyes are asking what's wrong. They can't interrupt the show for too long without incident, so they need to make a decision fast.

'Out?' Nagisa mouths, and Haru nods... but it's easier said than done. Opening the gate at this point in the show will give the precursor to the rest of the pod that it's time to leave. However, Aiko ignoring the commands will set a bad example too; the dolphins are more fond of variety than they are of performing, and so if Aiko isn't paying attention, it could be only a matter of time before they lose them, and the show. A decision needs to be made fast.

Haru makes his decision, stands, and moves to open the gate. From across the show pool, he hears the orca's high, anxious wail followed by a lower, almost creaking vocalisation. Just as he lifts his head to listen, he sees one of the dolphins apparently doing the same, and then, shockingly, crashing into one of the others mid-air with a pained screech. The two animals crash back down into the water and within seconds the rest of the pod has broken from control and milled around them, squeaking anxiously as they nudge the concerned parties—Baby and Yoko, it seems to be, though it's too busy for Haru to see—to the surface. Nobody seems hurt. But a worried murmur has quickly risen in the audience, and it's clear that the rest of the show is probably off the cards.

He hears Nagisa offering a hurried explanation over the microphone while the dolphins continue making a fuss. But his eyes are only on Aiko, who only floats with her face to the wall, squeezing her eyes shut as if the sound is hurting her. She's starting to chuff repeatedly from her blowhole, expelling air in loud, resonant honks.

The orca cries out again. Haru can hear splashing from over in the med pool, and the vet's raised voice. Though his chest aches unexpectedly, he knows he needs to concentrate on Aiko.

He gently taps the tip of her beak to get her attention, then points her back into the dolphin tank. She moves slowly. Did something happen to her during the show? Only minutes ago, she'd been happily swimming with the others, with him, the picture of grace and liveliness.

When he looks at her now, the permanent smile etched into her features looks false and terrifying. The speakers are still blaring hollow, English music over the sound of the audience's footsteps. The show is over, and what is left? Two possibly injured dolphins, an obviously traumatised killer whale, and... Aiko. He swallows the lump in his throat. How could this happen...?

“Haru, we need you! Haru!”

Rin approaches behind him as he kneels next to Aiko, who lies eerily still in the water.

“Get the vet,” he says, “something's wrong.”

“Rei's busy. Neptune freaked out when he heard the gate and cut his face. We need your help.”

_Makoto._ Haru feels as if the bottom has dropped out of his stomach. Makoto had been so afraid of the gate. He hadn't even thought about it, only...

“Dolphins,” he hears himself saying.

“What?” Rin says, and Haru realises he can't have even seen the incident.

“The dolphins collided.”

“Is that what happened to...” Rin looks down at the water. He's obviously forgotten Aiko's name. “To... her?”

“No. She's only... she's... sick.” Against his will he feels his eyes moistening. Aiko seemed _fine_ this morning. She seemed fine an hour ago. Why now?

“Fuck. Uh...” Rin puts his hand to his forehead. “Look, I'll get Nagisa to stay with her. We've got to help Rei.”

“I don't want...”

“To what, leave her? But you'll leave him?” Rin points over at the med pool. Another shriek rings over the stadium. “This is kind of crucial, Haru. You guys brought him here without even having a proper pool set up, and he is _your_ responsibility—”

“ _I_ never asked for—” Haru hears his voice raising, and then in the front of his mind are Makoto's eyes, green and wide and frightened. His eyes, and the answer he gave him slowly and quietly in the office last night, with the moon shining through the blinds. “I never wanted...”

_I'm the only one who knows about you,_ he thinks, and a tear finally falls from the corner of his eye. 

“Haru,” says Rin, and he's glad they can't see each other's faces, “it's not your fault. I'm sorry. Let's just sort this out.”

“Aiko,” he says, softly, “be good for Nagisa.”

The dolphin looks up at him tiredly, and closes her eyes. Then her blowhole.

Too late, Haru realises. Too late he reaches desperately for her flippers to pull her up as she slips under the water. She opens her eyes one last time, rolling into his arms. Then her muscles convulse and slacken. She slips from his grip, sinking to the bottom of the pool like the heaviest thing Haru can imagine.

 

* * *

  

“Haru...”

His heart is pounding coldly in his ears.

“Haru?”

His vision blurs, like the distant shape of Aiko's body at the bottom of the pool.

“Haru, look...” Rin's voice sounds so far away, but then Haru feels his arm wrap around his shoulder as the other man kneels next to him. He takes a breath like he means to speak again, then lets it go in a sigh.

Haru still stares down into the water. Against all he knows, he prays that it wasn't real; that his eyes will snap open and they will be swimming together again in the show pool. Happy.

An odd thought occurs to him then. _Was_ Aiko happy?

He wants to think so. He wants to know so. But... her mouth is still smiling even now. How can it mean anything? Haru shivers and Rin pulls him closer, guiding his head down onto his shoulder.

“I know. I know,” he's saying.

_No, you don't,_ thinks Haru, because Rin doesn't  _love_ Aiko like he does, didn't feed her and play with her and  _know_ her like he did. But perhaps he's not talking about Aiko, anyway. Haru knows next to nothing about what Rin has done these past ten years; who he's loved, who he's lost.

“I've got you. It's okay.”

Haru doesn't cry, but he feels like a hole has been torn in him under anaesthetic, and he's picking at the ragged edges in disbelief. The only things that feel real are Rin's arms around him, so warm and solid that he can't bear it.

“Get off,” he whispers, and Rin obeys, but slowly.

“Haru—”

“Help the vet with Neptune,” he says, standing up, “right?”

Rin gives him a slightly helpless look. “I can go back and—”

“No.” It hurts to even think about leaving, but he knows if he doesn't move now then maybe he never will. He forces himself to turn his back on the pool. Usually when pain fills him up, he gives himself over to the water, but the only places to swim here are now inexorably associated with Aiko, and will only bring him closer to the source.

Another high scream rings from the med pool. It grounds him, in a sense; worry replacing grief in a slowly building surge. When he gets there, the med pool is a frothy mess of churning water, and Makoto is smacking his head roughly, repeatedly, on the ledge. At first Haru can't see it, but when he holds his head briefly still he sees blood seeping from a long scratch on his jaw. Ryugazaki is standing helplessly by the spotter's bench.

“Nanase-san, it doesn't look bad, but it could get worse if he doesn't stop moving like that. The med pool is—” The vet swallows. “It's too small for him to move around in so much.”

_Aiko's dead,_ Haru wants to say, but he only nods and starts to slide down onto the ledge next to the thrashing whale before Ryugazaki can stop him.

“N-Nanase-san, stop!”

Haru barely hears him. He dips his feet into the heaving water, sinking down onto the concrete. The whale brings up his head again and slams it down on the ledge with a loud 'smack'. Then, slowly, his eyes train onto Haru and he falls still again.

_It's okay,_ Haru tries to tell him silently, extending his hand slowly,  _you were just scared._

“Did you hurt yourself?” he asks, softly, beckoning with his head. “Let me look at it.”

Even if Makoto doesn't understand his words—at least, not like this—he seems to be comforted by the tone of his voice, and moves up closer to him again. Haru kneels, taking the animal's huge head in his arms. The scratch on his chin is still bleeding, but it probably looks worse than it is. Other than that Makoto seems unhurt, unless he damaged his teeth with the impact. He's not sure how he can get him to open his mouth without any training, though. Feeling a little foolish, he opens his own mouth to demonstrate, tapping Makoto's rostrum to encourage him to do the same.

His chest clenches. It's how he trained Aiko. Pushing her from his mind right now is impossible, no matter how much he wants to force himself to focus on Makoto.

It takes a while, but the orca does open his mouth. Luckily there hasn't been any damage, so Haru nods, rubbing his rostrum again to let him know he doesn't need to just lie there gaping. Instead of closing his mouth right away, Makoto nudges forward slightly and noses his chest, his large pink tongue curving around the training whistle hanging around Haru's neck. Haru almost smiles. From the side of the med pool, he hears the vet laughing softly.

What happens next happens so quickly Haru doesn't have time to react. Makoto closes his mouth on the whistle and tugs him forward. In the seconds it takes Haru to lose his balance he releases with a jerk of his head, tossing him off the ledge and into the water. It's only about four feet deep—normally nothing to worry about—but the whale is curving his body around to hem him in, slowly pushing him up against the wall.

“Are you okay?” Ryugazaki calls from up above.

_I don't know,_ Haru thinks numbly, as Makoto tucks his head under the water and bumps it against his legs. “I think so.”

“Can you get out?”

With a jolt, Haru feels Makoto's mouth close on his leg. He's not biting down—in fact, he seems to be making every effort to be as gentle as possible—but he also isn't letting go. Haru pulls his leg away slightly and Makoto jerks back.

“Just a moment.”

“Is—is he biting you?”

“No. He's just... holding.” Haru reaches under the water to touch the whale's head again, trying to coax his jaws open. This time Makoto pulls back, leaving Haru floating on his back, keeping himself afloat with his arms and one foot on the bottom of the pool.

“What's going on?”

...Rin's here. Haru assumes he's about to flip out and make everything worse, as usual, but as he tilts his head back he sees him take a breath, climb down slowly on the ledge, and reach out into the water for one of Haru's hands.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Can you feel his teeth?”

“Not really.”

“Move your leg? Carefully.”

Haru tries, but Makoto shakes his head very slowly, as if in reprimand. “No.”

“Okay. That's fine. You're doing fine. Stay relaxed.”

It's weird hearing Rin sound sensible, but Haru just nods.

“Hey, Neptune,” he says, calmly, “who's a good boy? You're a good boy, right?”

 _Are you serious?_ thinks Haru, as Rin just laughs softly and lets go of his hand.

“Pat him a bit. He just needs to chill.”

A little bit awkwardly, Haru shifts forward as much as he can and lays his hands on the whale's head just below his blowhole. It's strange to think that twelve hours ago, Makoto wasn't a whale at all but a tall, timid-looking man with droopy eyes and a soft smile. Perhaps if he were like that now, it would be easier to tell what he was thinking.

_Are you angry?_ _Did I do something wrong?_ Perhaps he did. Haru wonders, darkly, if Aiko's condition, too, might have been something he could have— _should_ have sensed. If so, then maybe... maybe...

Without realising it, he's gone limp, and whatever novelty his leg represented before seems to be wearing off. Gradually, Makoto's grip loosens on his shin and he's able to slide it from his jaws. He bows his head forward against Makoto's, unsure if he's thanking him or just looking for the closest place to collapse.

“Sorry,” he whispers against his skin, just as Rin taps his shoulder.

“Back up, back up. Nice and slow.” He feels his legs following his instructions. “That's good. Up here with me.”

He moves backward onto the ledge, the whale still following him closely, Rin helping him up with his hands under his arms. Once both of them are on the ledge, Rin calls up to Rei. “Is there a bucket up there?”

A second's pause. “Yes.”

Rin turns to Haru. “Can you get up there and pass it down?”

In his current state Haru can't do anything but obey. Once Rin has the bucket, he hands Makoto a fish straight away and the whale readily opens his mouth, accepting several handfuls. “That's right, good boy. I  _knew_ you were a good boy, didn't I?” He rubs Makoto's head again firmly, flicking his whistle over his shoulder before leaning over to kiss him on the nose. “You are  _such_ a  _good_ boy.”

Next to him, Haru hears the vet giggle just a little.

“Oi.” Rin stands slowly, picking up his bucket, and passes it up to Haru before climbing out of the pool again. “I'm doing you guys a favour. You're not hurt, right?”

Haru shakes his head. Rin looks him up and down all the same.

“You probably already know this from dolphins, but killer whales need to be stimulated. You'd better _hope_ that fish and attention is more exciting for him than pulling you in the water, but don't count on it. You're fucking _lucky_ , you idio—” He pulls himself up, averting his eyes. “Well... I'm glad you're okay.”

“Mm.”

“I...” Rin rubs the back of his neck. “Nagisa and I... got Aiko out of the water. The other dolphins are back in their pool and nobody's hurt, so... let's move this big guy back into the show pool, okay? Really slow.”

The low groan of the med-pool gate opening causes another series of shivers from the whale, but this time he seems almost sheepish as he passes through, diving to the bottom of the show pool once he enters and staying there, circling, as they close up the gate again. Rin and Haru go down to the slideout to feed him again, and Rin keeps his arm between Haru and the water.

“Stop it,” he says, after a while. “I don't need to be babied.”

“It's not that, I just—” Rin sighs, then, forcing a grin, turns his attention back to Makoto. “Do _you_ think—”

The whale sinks under the water and blows bubbles at him, then swims off slowly, surfacing again in the corner of the tank with his back to them.

“Rude, huh?” Rin laughs, but with the last of the adrenaline from the med pool leaving his system, Haru feels as if all his energy has bled out into the water. Mercifully, Rin notices, and stops trying to be funny. “Okay, come on. You still need to say goodbye, right?”

 

* * *

 

It turns out not being as dramatic as anyone expected. Aiko isn't Aiko by the time he sees her on the concrete—like the two pilot whales—just an empty mass of flesh and bone lying outside the vet's office with a farcical grin still plastered on her face. Haru sighs and lays his hand on her beak, once, then straightens up again.

“We'll do an autopsy,” says Ryugazaki, as sensitively as he can, “but it might take a while to figure out what was wrong. If—”

He's interrupted by Nagisa bursting into tears as he enters the room, instantly making a beeline for Haru and wrapping his arms around him tightly. “Oh, Haru-chan, it's the worst! I'm so sorry.”

“It's not your fault,” says Haru. It's relieving to see someone reacting with the candor he finds so impossible; he can always count on Nagisa for that.

Director Hazuki is not far behind his son. He lingers in the doorway for a moment, then bends down to peel back the thin tarpaulin covering the dolphin's body. He sighs deeply and pets her drying skin. Then he stands, slowly, and joins Nagisa in putting his arms around Haru.

“I'm sorry, Haruka. I know you were very fond of her.”

“Thank you,” says Haru, tensing slightly under the hug. Rin clears his throat loudly, and Nagisa's father pulls back.

“Yes, Rin?”

“I just wanted to mention something else,” he says, “about the killer whale.”

Even Nagisa's hold loosens a little now, and Haru ducks out from under it more easily.

“Yes, what is it?” asks the director.

“We had a low-level aggression incident earlier with Haru in the med pool. It wasn't serious but we shouldn't ignore it.” On one hand Haru's glad Rin went out of his way to distract the Hazukis; on the other, did it _have_ to be this? “What's the system for incident reports here? Do we need to update a training profile or anything?”

The director fumbles a little. “Uh, well, we don't usually—there _aren't_ many incidents here...”

“But if, say, an animal bites someone, or...”

“Oh, yes, yes. Generally, we'd, uh, deal with it onsite. There's not any need to record it if it's only a little mistake...” He laughs, but Rin is staring at him in such a way that it fades. He puffs up almost defensively. “There's never been an accident here that required more than a quick doctor's visit and a day or two off. I have complete confidence in my staff.”

The statement is twofold. Since Iwatobi is so small, the aquarium's staff aren't just Mr. Hazuki's employees—they're his family, both blood-related and otherwise. Haru knows him now as a boss, but as a child he was just Nagisa's dad, who took them to see penguin chicks the day they hatched, shouted them for ice cream and came to their school prizegiving. Even Rin ought to remember him ruffling his hair, cleaning up his face and skinned knee back when they were ten and he decided to impress Haru with his supposed ability to ride a bike with no hands.

 _I have_ _complete confidence in my staff._ The unspoken addition being, of course, _Why don't you? You're an Iwatobi boy. Aren't you?_

“I... so do I.” It's rare for Rin to stutter, and even rarer for him to soften himself out of respect. “But, sir, accidents happen in my park all the time, even with people who are used to the whales. It's important for safety that these sorts of things are recorded consistently.”

“Then do it. That's why you're here, isn't it?” Hazuki shakes his head, then looks down at Aiko again with a heavy sigh. “Sorry, Rin, I don't mean to be short with you. It's just... it never gets any easier, does it? We should expect these things, working with animals, but sometimes...”

His eyes glisten slightly, and he turns away, clapping his hands together. “Right. I need to go. Ryugazaki-san, you've got this in hand, I trust?”

“Yes, sir,” the vet replies quickly.

As the director leaves and the four of them are left in the room together, Rin discreetly reaches for Haru's hand. “How about I stay behind tonight and watch Neptune? You can go home.”

Neptune. Makoto. Haru's spine prickles. “No, I'll do it. He's our responsibility, right?”

“Yeah, ours. So—” Rin hesitates, then laughs uncomfortably, looking from Rei to Nagisa before returning his gaze to Haru. “Oh. You meant... ours. You guys.”

It hadn't occurred to him right away that he was excluding Rin with his statement; now that the damage is done, of course, it's too late to take it back. Besides, Rin wouldn't understand... he doesn't know how to explain to him yet about Makoto, and just letting him find out on his own doesn't seem fair to either of them.

That's assuming that last night was even real. So much has happened in such a short time that Haru hasn't had time to process it. Even so, he doesn't want to give up on Makoto. If their conversation last night wasn't real, it doesn't matter; something about it that has stayed with him.

_What are you?_ he had asked, and Makoto had looked all the way into his eyes and answered, his voice soft and low as the sound of distant waves, crashing powerfully against stony cliffs and into secret coves, slowly carving out the shape of the world.

 

* * *

 

He's glad to be alone later that night, with the moonlight quivering on the water's surface as he sits next to the slideout, waiting. Makoto has been logging in the corner of the pool for some time now, only occasionally drifting over to the sides to be fed before diving back under and squirming against the bottom of the pool, as if trying to make it give way. Watching him like this, Haru can't help but feel that he's failed him. At first he thinks he's projecting his feelings for Aiko again, but... no. There really is something terribly sad about seeing such a huge animal look so powerless.

Midnight rolls around slowly. Haru has been sitting with his head in his knees at the top of the slideout, and as the clocktower chimes, Makoto's dorsal fin rises out of the water nearest to him. It catches the moonlight... or that's what Haru thinks, at first. The orca's black skin starts to reflect white all over. As he dives under again the water's surface, too, shines white; not bright and brilliant, like the sun, but with an eerie, muted glow that fades away in a few moments as if it had never been there.

Tonight it doesn't take as long to get Makoto out of the water. Since he'd been anticipating it, he left his wetsuit on for the rest of the day, and as he was so close to the slideout it doesn't take long to reach him and bring him back to the surface. Luckily he's held his breath this time, but when they get to the surface he gasps, collapsing onto his wobbly hands and knees. “Why... why do you do that?”

“Do what?”

Makoto struggles to find words. “You just... you breathe. You breathe even when it doesn't make sense.”

This Haru actually knows. “Oh... it's...”

He wants to explain to Makoto about voluntary respiration versus human breathing, but all he can think of is Aiko's blowhole, squeezed shut, and the way she'd twitched and slackened in his arms. A thick lump forms in his throat. She could have breathed, if she'd wanted to. Didn't she want to? Suddenly he's angry; angry with her, angry with himself for being angry with her, angry at all of this

“Haru...?” Makoto's teeth are chattering. Haru looks over at him and, of course, he's naked, kneeling in chilled water. What's wrong with him? Why is he being so insensitive all of a sudden?

“Come on,” he says, and helps him out of the pool area and into the office. This time Makoto seems to understand the towel a bit better, and dries himself off, mostly. Haru helps him towards the end, more because he can't stand to stay still than anything else. He gets out the blanket again, and as he's draping it over his shoulders, Makoto lifts up the discarded towel and places it on Haru's head, rubbing clumsily. Haru fidgets and he draws his hands back, looking sheepish.

“I'm sorry. Your hair was wet... and that makes it very cold doesn't it? That's how it is for me.” When Haru doesn't respond, he frowns and looks down at him. “What's wrong? Your song was sad today.”

“My... song?”

“Ah, that's not right. I mean... I mean your voice. Only it isn't only your voice... I don't think humans have a word for it. It's something more. It's all the sound in your body; it's how you can tell when someone is happy, or...” Shaking his head, he wraps the blanket tighter around himself, still shivering faintly with cold. “I could sense it before, but it's hard in this body. It must be really difficult for you to understand each other. Is it?”

“Sometimes,” Haru replies. Slowly, he gets up onto the sofa with him.

“Did something happen today?”

Haru doesn't answer straight away. He's hardly even spoken about it since it happened, even though he could feel Rin and Nagisa watching him anxiously all day.

“I knew you were upset when you came down to... to help me. I can't understand your words when we're like that, but I knew something awful had happened. I... I was silly, panicking like that. What happened to you must have been so much worse...” He laughs nervously. “I tried to make you feel better, but then the others got upset. Did I do something wrong?”

It takes Haru a while to piece together Makoto's perspective of the day's events. Eventually he gets it, with only a single missing piece; “Tried... to make me feel better?”

“You... you said you could swim. And it seemed like the water made you happy. I could hear your song when you were swimming with the smaller ones. I thought you would feel better if...” He trails off, lowering his gaze shamefully. “I was wrong, wasn't I...? You... didn't like it.”

Haru looks at him. It's bizarre to think that this shy, gentle man had had three inch long teeth and thousands of pounds of muscle behind him not even ten minutes before. Something in the way he holds himself suggests he's half-expecting his body to collapse; it's certainly not an air one would expect from one of the ocean's deadliest predators, but...

_I'm not a human,_ he'd said last night, firmly, even though his voice was shaking.  _This isn't my body. This isn't who I am. I'm a whale and my family are whales and I—_

_Yes?_ Haru had asked, after he had been silent for a long time.

_And I want... to go home. I—I have to find Ran and Ren first. They need me... without Mum, they'll need..._ He'd stopped again, covering his face with his hands.  _Mum. Mum..._

How could someone who was hurting that much even think about trying to comfort someone else? Haru thinks that, then realises he'd done just the same thing by climbing into the med pool earlier that day. It seems so selfish in retrospect; helping Makoto had seemed like the perfect distraction from his own pain, rather than being a genuine act of compassion. Could it be that they're both in the same boat, in this respect? If so, it seems unfair to dash his efforts outright.

“I... didn't know what you were trying to do. That's all.” He pauses. He's forgotten something, hasn't he...? “Thank you.”

Makoto smiles, his gentle eyes drifting closed. “Next time. I'll do better next time.”

 _Why didn't you let go?_ Haru thinks of asking, but he has a feeling the answer might be more complicated than he can really bear with right now. After a while he notices Makoto watching him, then shuffling slowly closer, tilting toward him slightly before timidly leaning his shoulder against his again.

“I'm sorry you're hurting,” he says quietly, “do you want to talk about it?”

“My friend died today,” Haru confesses, voice cracking. He doesn't know why he's blurting it out, or why he's so emotional around someone he's not even completely convinced is real, but before he knows it he's collapsing forward with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. He doesn't know where in the sentence he started crying, just that by the end of it he's shaking and his face is wet.

If none of this is real then it doesn't matter. He can cry to the empty room as much as he wants and not worry about being judged. It doesn't end up like that, though; after a moment, Makoto leans over and lays his chin on the nape of his neck, one arm sliding out from over the blanket and draping over his back.

“It doesn't feel real, does it?” he whispers, tucking his face down so Haru can feel the tip of his nose pressing to his skin. Something wet and warm falls onto his back, and he realises that Makoto is crying too. “When Mum was... I thought I must be dreaming. We've never been apart before, not really. Not like this.”

That hits Haru like ice. He should have known better than to act like this in front of someone who was still grieving themselves—for their mother, no lesss—but last night was so surreal and today has been such a nightmare that he just hasn't had time to process everything Makoto already told him.

Usually, he isn't a very physical person. But he sits up, slowly, so as not to hit him in the face, turns slightly and wraps his arms around him, letting him tuck his head into his shoulder. It doesn't feel like the way Rin holds him, all warm and firm and yearning; they're both still a little cold, and Makoto isn't really used to having hands, so he tends to move his arm by the shoulder and rotate his forearm like he's trying to steer himself. It makes for a bit of an awkward “hug”, with Makoto essentially just placing his arms either side of him and squeezing inward with his elbows.

He hears the man—no—he hears the orca take a breath, preparing to speak again. “I know I asked you a favour last time... b-but I—I understand—”

“No.” Haru cuts him off and pulls back, wiping his eyes with the back of his arm before looking up at him firmly. “I'll do it. I promised.”

“Thank you,” says Makoto, not bothering to dry his own eyes. Then he leans over and solemnly presses his lips and nose to his forehead, briefly poking his tongue out against the skin.

Well. Okay.

Haru can't say being licked by a killer whale in a grown man's body is usually a factor in his day, but Makoto looks so sincere when he draws back again that he immediately feels guilty for frowning. Of course he isn't used to this body, or humans in general, so he's going to be unsure of how to act. He just nods slowly.

“I promised,” he repeats softly.

Makoto's eyes well up again. “Haru...”

Hearing his name shouldn't hurt. He shouldn't feel this affected by someone he barely knows, someone who may as well be a dream. Haru doesn't know what it _should_ be like, but surely it's not this.

“I'll help you,” he tells him, tells himself, as Makoto leans into him once more. “I'll find them. Then...”

 

* * *

 

 

When he gets home at two in the morning, Rin's still sitting in the living room on his laptop, the blue glow of the screen illuminating his drawn face. He looks up at him, then averts his eyes as if he's embarrassed. “Hey. Couldn't sleep.”

Haru knows he's lying. He's always lied about things like that, like he can't stand for Haru to know how much he cares even when it's obvious. “ _I didn't stay up all night_ ”.“ _It's no big deal_ ”.“ _I'd do that for any of my friends_ ”.All of it translates to “yeah, I love you, but not that much”.

So when highschool had finished and Rin had said, “move to Tokyo with me”, Haru had asked, “why?”. It had nothing to do with questioning that Rin wanted to be with him; it was more about questioning why, all of a sudden, he was so willing to admit it.

Haru had wanted things to stay the way they were. He'd been happy with Rin—happier than he'd ever been before or since—but Rin only ever wanted things to change, wanted everything bigger and better. It was fine the way it was, he'd tried to explain. He didn't need a boyfriend with his own place in the city and the best body and the coolest job. He needed Rin.

Perhaps that was it. Perhaps he'd just been scared of losing the Rin he knew to the glamour and glory that he'd been assured the move to Tokyo would bring. In the end, he'd lost him anyway.

“You should go to bed,” he says.

“Yeah, in a minute.” Rin looks at him for a while. Finally, awkwardly, he speaks. “Hey, Haru, if you wanted to talk about—”

“I don't.” It comes out in a slow huff of breath that seems to be his last. He supposes venting with Makoto took more out of him than he expected.

“Okay. Okay, that's fine.” Rin hesitates, then holds out his arm. “I'm watching some videos of my shows. You wanna see?”

“Shows with whales?”  
“No, shows with chickens. _Yes_ , shows with whales.” He rolls his eyes. “Do you wanna see or not?”

His arms are still open, and Haru knows exactly how he'll fit into them, how they'll fold around him a little too tight and how Rin will lay his cheek on the top of his head and breathe so quietly into his hair. He doesn't want to fall back into those arms in case he can never get back up.

“I'm not tired anyway.”

“You will be,” laughs Rin, loading up the first video on his screen. “Look at this.”

 


	5. Rin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaay! Thought I'd upload this today so nobody could say I hadn't updated for over a month... because now it has been exactly a month, lol.  
> I love writing Rin so much. He's the sort of character who is really unintentionally funny to me because he takes things so seriously and the people around him are just like "what???". It's so cute. Rin is the best.
> 
> I have had some really nice feedback from you guys both on here and on my tumblr. Thank you so much! I love hearing from you. \o/ Please talk to me more, now that season 2 is out I desperately need more people to geek out with. <3
> 
>  **This week I'm showing you a short video (about 1min20s) showing an incident that occurred at Seaworld San Diego during November 2006.**  
>  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTXE653JPOg  
> If you can't be bothered to watch it, here's a brief transcript:  
> 0:00 - Show going normally.  
> 0:09 - Waterwork trainer and whales called back to stage.  
> 0:15 - Whale "swims over" waterwork trainer, submerging him.  
> It is clear that the whale then took the trainer deeper underwater, rather than immediately letting him go. The second whale breaks from the stage and joins them.  
> 0:30-40 - Trainers at stage attempt to recall whales with handslaps, hydrophone (yellow box in female trainer's hand). Whales respond and return to stage, trainer in water makes it to the surface.  
> 0:45-ish - Male trainer (bald) seen giving whale on right a "hand target" (training signal), whale takes some time to respond.  
> 1:05 - Waterwork trainer limps from the stage after making it out of the water.  
> 1:15 - Tacky music still audible.

The man dives off the stage and vanishes beneath the water. Seconds pass with the stadium in suspenseful silence, save for the low murmur of the music. Then a blurry shape appears beneath the surface; a note is held in the soundtrack and then—

Man and whale burst from the water in a sforzando, the man seeming small and weightless as a doll perched on the great animal's nose. He pitches forward, dives again, and the two of them fall back into the water to cheering and awed sighs.

“So,” says Rin, pausing the video, “that behaviour's called a stand-on. I mean, you won't learn it for ages, but it doesn't hurt to look at it. I'd show you a rocket hop, but I'm not sure if your pool is big enough for them.”

“'Ro-ketto hoppu'.”

It's close enough. The average audience member wouldn't know the difference, so Rin just shrugs. “Anyway, it's where the whale flicks you off the rostrum at the apex of the leap. You fly through the air for a bit and dive back in.”

“That sounds dangerous.”

“Um, yeah. That's why it's so awesome.” Rin laughs, though it fades as he continues. “A few people at my park did hurt themselves during practises. The whales are really strong, so it's all about precision.”

Haru stays quiet and shifts a little bit closer. Rin winds his arm around his waist tighter, and falters a few times before finally just laying his head on top of his. Fuck it, right? If Haru didn't want to be like this, he'd just leave. The fact that he's even deigning to cuddle with him is a miracle in itself; even when they were dating, Haru hadn't really liked to be held for too long. Rin used to laugh and say he was like an oversized cat, and sometimes Haru would stare at him blankly in response and meow very unenthusiastically. He was an idiot like that.

“Did you get hurt?”

Haru's soft voice hits him like a bolt from a crossbow. He opens his mouth to say no, even as a guilty throb of pain sings through his knees. “I... yeah. A couple of times.”

“By accident?”

“Yeah. No—well, sort of. We have this whale called Atlas, and he's pretty big. Sometimes when people got in the water with him, he'd get excited and bump into them. It wasn't a big deal, but then he started grabbing feet.” He's got to be delicate in how he puts this. He might have come down harshly earlier, but really the last thing he wants is Haru or anyone else freaking out around the whales because of some horror story he told them. “So, nobody got badly hurt for a while. He just sort of dunked people, and everyone thought he was playing. Then one of the other trainers got taken under for a whole minute. When Atlas brought him back up, we realised he'd broken his ankle.”

“The whale brought him back up?”

“Yeah. We tried to get him out ourselves with the safety equipment, but we couldn't really do anything. It was...” Rin realises he's gone tense, rolls his shoulders to loosen them up. “It was... pretty terrifying. Knowing we couldn't really compete with this animal. And that our friend could...”

Haru doesn't say anything, but leans his cheek on Rin's shoulder and rubs just once.

“He was okay. But the staff had no idea what to do with Atlas. At first we tried to keep his routine the same, but then he rammed me during a training session. In the end, management decided the trainers couldn't swim with him any more.”

“Were you scared?” asks Haru quietly.

Rin closes his eyes. In his mind, he's back in the water with Atlas, holding his dorsal fin as the two of them dive to the bottom of the pool. Then the whale stops, turning his huge head towards him. It doesn't occur to him anything's wrong. He turns around to face him for the three-second “neutral response” they give for an incorrect behaviour. They can continue later. It doesn't matter.

He sees his huge tail flukes lifting as he turns towards him and, too late, hears the surge of water in his ears as the huge animal launches himself at him, his blunt nose striking him in the side of his chest. A rib cracks but there's no pain. Suddenly, he feels churning water and cold air on the back of his neck as Atlas pushes him to the surface with the force of his blow.

Someone on the stage has seen. They were faster this time; faster than they were for the last accident. They pull him out just in time to see the whale surfacing behind him, his expression indiscernable.

Whoever's holding him is asking if he's okay. Rin can't stop looking at Atlas, where he's floating by the stage, peeking sheepishly above the water as if he's embarrassed by what he did. He doesn't feel afraid of this animal. Not really.

“No,” he says. “It's more like... Atlas and I worked together the most, so I was mostly just... shocked. Like my best friend just punched me in the face for no reason.”

“It's like that, then,” murmurs Haru, and Rin knows he's thinking about the incident in the med pool. But those two haven't had nearly enough time to develop the sort of relationship he'd had with Atlas; that had taken more than seven years, and Haru and Neptune haven't even known each other a week.

“Look, Haru... I'm not telling you to be scared of the whale. You need to trust each other as much as you can. Relationship's important.” Rin feels Haru's arm sliding around his middle and his stomach twists. “Just... don't do anything dumb.”

“I won't be able to,” says Haru flatly. “You'll be there.”

Rin's heart ends up in his throat and he swallows it hard, squeezing Haru against his side. How is everything so simple in his mind when Rin can barely see from A to B without a thousand “can't”s “won't”s and “shouldn't”s blocking the way? He tries for a very long time to ask him. By the time he's worked up the urge, Haru's nodded off on his shoulder and Rin lowers down with him onto the living room floor, pulling out the pillows and blankets from under the kotatsu where they've always been to build a makeshift bed for them both. As he's lying down beside him Haru rolls over onto his back, eyelids flickering as if he might wake up. The moment passes, and Rin's nerve goes with it.

 

* * *

 

“Three... two... one, and...!”

The camera clicks several times and the people assembled on the show stage strike their respective poses. Most of them are sensible, but Nagisa throws up a peace sign before he can be stopped.

Nitori gazes down at the camera for a moment, flicking through the photos, then looks back up at them and nods.

“Yes, these are fine,” he says. He smiles at Rin, then gazes past him at Neptune who is half-beached on the slideout, tail still dragging in the water. “What a great model! Thanks so much, Hazuki-san.”

“You're welcome,” say Nagisa and his father at the same time. Director Hazuki laughs and gives him a playful nudge with his elbow.

“That's quite all right. Is there anything else you need?”

Nitori smiles. “No, thank you, sir. This is plenty.”

“Oh, rubbish—here, here, we insist.”

Rin stifles a laugh as the Director presses a novel's worth of vouchers into the journalist's hands. Nitori, polite to a fault, looks flustered but accepts them with a little bow.

“Th-thank you!” he manages, as the Director claps him on the shoulder and leaves, his loud laugh trailing behind him. Rin goes to peer over his shoulder at the photos and notices Rei isn't far behind, though Nagisa seems to be keeping his distance for some reason. Maybe he's keeping an eye on Haru, who is still kneeling next to the whale in the shallow water, just staring at him silently. Those two are starting to weird him the fuck out, in all honesty, but he decides he'll just leave it for now.

“I like this one,” Nitori says suddenly. “Rin-senpai's smile is so funny.”  
“Who are you calling—”

“He's right there, Aiichirou, don't tease him like that.”

There's a sort of weird half-beat where Rin realises Nitori wasn't talking to him. There's an even weirder half-beat when he realises the person he was talking to was...

“Haha. You're right, Rei, that was mean. Sorry, Rin-senpai.”

'Aiichirou'? 'Rei'? Are they seriously not going to use any honorifics at all? Rin's known Nitori for ten years, though they haven't always been in contact, and he's never heard him call  _anyone_ without honorifics.  _Ever_ . So how do these two know each other? It's not from high school, and they have completely different jobs, so—

...Wait. Wait a second.

“How do you guys know each other again?” he asks.

Rei blinks rapidly in embarrassment, but Nitori takes it in stride and laughs. “Oh... sorry, I forgot I hadn't told you. We dated in university.”

The pieces don't quite click together in Rin's mind. “You what?”

“We dated. For six months.” He puts his hand on Rei's back casually. “It didn't work out, but we're still friends.”

Rei nods, smiling in this stilted, embarrassed sort of way. With the suddenness and shock of being hit in the face with a tennis racquet, Rin instantly imagines them making out. It's just an accident; normally he absolutely would not consider how either of these people kiss—seriously—but he's not exactly great at steering his thoughts in the right direction these days. Really, though, this is less like swerving and narrowly missing something than it is like swerving and going hurtling off a cliffside into the ocean.

“Rin-senpai, are you okay?”

“I'm fine.” He's actually not fine. He's so embarrassed it isn't even funny, and at this stage the heat in his cheeks has gone all the way up into his ears. “Well. I didn't know that. Thanks.”

Nagisa chooses now to join in the conversation, peeking over Rei and Nitori's shoulders before pushing between them and leaning over towards Rin. “What did you do to Rin-chan? He looks like he's about to pass out or something.”

“Shut up, Nagisa!”

“A-ah, it's all right,” says Rei, quickly. “He was just a little surprised. W-well, anyway, I have to go; they hired a new vet for the birds and pinnipeds, s-so I really should—”

Nagisa beams and hooks his elbow immediately around his. “Cool! I'll come with you. Let's go, Rei-chan!”

He almost drags him off, though he's still smiling. As the two of them retreat, Rin hears Rei flustering over Nagisa's insistence that they 'walk like penguins to see the penguins' and the splash behind him as Neptune wriggles back off the slideout and into the water. Haru comes over to join the two of them, staring down Nitori for a long moment before he looks back to Rin.

“What happened?”

Rin shrugs. Nitori just sighs and presses his fingers to his temples. “I'm sorry... I didn't mean to cause trouble.”

“You didn't do anything,” says Rin, honestly.

“O-oh, I know, just... Nagisa-san doesn't like me very much, so I try to stay out of his way.”

“I don't think Nagisa's capable of disliking someone,” Rin snorts. Haru takes a breath, but doesn't say anything. He just stands there doing his annoying 'you're wrong, Rin, but I'm not going to tell you why' face. “ _Anyway_ , the Director _asked_ you to come and take the photos for the article so who cares? Not like you came just to piss him off.”

He still doesn't buy that Nagisa  _is_ pissed off, of course. Why should he be? Nitori just calmly told him something that was obviously true. Big deal.

“Thanks, Rin-senpai, but I'll go now. You guys are probably busy, so—” He opens his arm like he wants to hug him goodbye again, then looks at Haru and puts it back down, making a show of putting his lens cap back on instead. “I'll see you around, okay?”

“I'll text you when we start doing shows,” says Rin.

“Thanks. I guess I'll be coming back more than I thought.” He gestures to the vouchers, which are barely fitting in his jacket pocket, and plucks one out to read it. “I can get... one free side and a drink with any large main at Rockhopper's.”

“That's you sorted, huh?”

He laughs again, waving as he starts to jog off. “Yeah. I'll give you some of my chips.”

“I'll hold you to that,” calls Rin, waving back.

There's a weird quiet after he's left where Haru just stares at him. Then he turns away with a little smile, unzipping his wetsuit and tying the arms around his waist.

“What?” asks Rin lowly.

Haru doesn't look back at him, but Rin can hear the smile in his voice. “He likes you.”

_Why does that make you happy?_ he thinks crossly, huffing. “He does  _not_ . Don't be weird.”

“Mm.” Haru, as usual, ignores him, and goes to kneel by the gate to the dolphin pool with his bucket, where Yoko, Baby and Oona give him a lukewarm greeting.

Koemi, the fourth dolphin, had died a few days after Aiko in a similar fashion; though mercifully this had happened during the night and not in the middle of a show. Director Hazuki was being as sensitive as he possibly could—all the same, he'd ordered two new animals from the currently ongoing drive hunts to replace the dead.

Rin remembers a similar bout of deaths from his own park not long after he'd started working there, though that had been striped dolphins, not bottlenose. He can't really remember what the explanation had been in the end. Either the vet had never gotten to the bottom of it, or management had simply decided not to tell them.

He still catches Haru's gaze on empty spaces in the dolphin's tank; spaces where, Rin imagines, Aiko still dives and dances through the clear water, smiling wide. It's true he doesn't know how close they were—not really—but he knows that Haru's friends are few and very precious to him. Part of what had drawn him to Haru as a child was the fact that he looked lonely, and he'd wanted to be the first in the swim club to see a smile lighting his earnest face.

He sees it more than he thought he would now, whenever Haru's with the animals. Perhaps if they were people, Haru would have a lot more friends... or, Rin thinks more strangely, it could be the other way around. Maybe Haru should have been born with flippers and a dorsal fin. Maybe he'd be happier if he'd been born in the sea, and could simply come up for air occasionally instead of constantly surrendering himself to the water. Only, then Rin would never have known him, and he doesn't know what his life would have been then.

 

* * *

 

As the week drags by, Rin starts to notice something severely weird going on in the aquarium.

“It's starting to get creepy,” he tells Nitori in Rockhopper's the following Monday, after the park technically closes to the public.

“What's creepy?” asks Nitori, who is conserving the remaining half of his iced chocolate by taking the tiniest sips possible.

“Haru's acting totally weird. He brought a whole bag of his dad's old clothes to work in a plastic bag for _no reason_.”

“No reason?”

“Well, _I_ haven't seen him wear them. But he brought them home yesterday and washed them, and brought them _back_ this morning. I asked him about it and he just looked at me funny.”

“Hm.”

“And then he brings his old cellphone to work and tapes it up by the pool in a plastic bag.”

Nitori frowns. “What?”

“ _I know_.” Rin huffs. “I took it out, but I couldn't find anything on it. All the messages were deleted and everything. There was just a bunch of alarms set just before midnight.”

“That _is_ weird.”

“I know! He won't tell me shit these days. Hardly ever comes home before one o'clock... god knows how he's doing that and working full days. Doctor Dork said—”

Nitori's eyes fix on his for a second, eyebrows raised and one corner of his mouth turned up in a look of disapproval.

“...I-I mean, Doctor Ryugazaki says he sees him sleeping in the trainer's office sometimes—he goes home before eleven, so he checks in on him—but what's he _doing_? Why is he waiting for midnight?”

“Maybe that's when he has to get home from the ball,” says Nitori mildly. Rin stares at him, and he flushes slightly. “I—I was kidding! I'm confused, too.”

They both pause. Rin drums his fingers on the table surface, ignoring the twinge in his knees.

“It's not just him, it's that damn whale,” he goes on. “He's actually a pretty slow learner in sessions, especially without an experienced animal teaching him, but he'll mess up the first day and the next morning he's doing everything perfectly.”

“Do you think Nanase-san's training the whale after hours?”

“I thought of it, but...” Rin falls quiet. The answer he'd come up with is still grating at the bottom of his stomach, but it seems petty next to the idea of Haru actually legitimately endangering his life by interacting with the whale alone, so he swallows it down.

Nitori watches him patiently as he finishes his iced chocolate. When Rin still doesn't say anything, he hastily pushes a bowl of wedges towards him across the table. “Here, why don't you have—”

“He's avoiding me,” Rin spits out, glaring into his own lap.

Nitori's hands stay on the bowl, and Rin hears him spinning it around on the surface of the table while he tries to think. “I'm sure that's not—”

“He is. He hardly says a thing to me outside of work. I'm staying in his _house_ and he won't talk to me, won't look at me. Unless it's about the damn whale, then—I don't get it.” He shakes his head. “Sorry. Whatever, it's—it doesn't even matter. It's stupid, I should be more worried about—”  
“Rin-senpai,” cuts in Nitori softly, “could I make a suggestion, please?”

What will it matter? “Yeah, sure.”

“Why don't you just come into work at night and see what he does? If he has the alarms set up near midnight, he's obviously doing something around then. Try and catch him in the act, you know?”

Rin has to admit there's no flaw in this logic. “I guess. But what if he sees me and doesn't do anything?”

“Well, if that were the case, you'd have to take more extreme measures. You could hide _your_ phone somewhere and record sound or something, or even set up a camera to—”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. This is Haru, not... I dunno, a bank heist or some weird movie.” In spite of himself, Rin laughs. “Damn, Nitori, that's kind of intense.”

“Do you want to know what's happening or not, though?” Nitori blinks, looking for all the world like an innocent little boy again. “If you're too nervous—”

“I'm not nervous!” snaps Rin and, only half-joking, adds: “Geez, I hope you never do an exposé on me. You're ruthless.”

“I don't do that sort of journalism,” Nitori nibbles on a wedge, and pushes the bowl over to Rin again. “I just want to write about sport. If I can't compete, I'll support people who can.”

“Why can't you compete?” asks Rin, suddenly. “You were pretty good back in high school.”

“Mm...” Nitori averts his eyes. “Maybe. But I was never as good as you guys—you know, you and Nanase-san. Yamazaki-san was good, too, what happened to him?”

“He got scouted. I guess he's training for the Olympics now.”

Nitori nods. “All of you... you just had something I didn't. Like... an X-factor, or something. Someone like me couldn't swim with killer whales or go to the Olympics. N-not as an athlete, anyway.”

“Natural talent's only some of it. You were a hard worker, so I bet—” Their eyes meet for a moment and suddenly, Nitori looks sad. Like his explanation had been less for Rin, and more for himself; something he'd murmur in his mind every night when the guilt burrowed into his chest and kneaded itself a nest.

_I could have done it, but I wasn't good enough._

_I could have done it, but I was better at other stuff anyway._

_I could have done it, but my legs—my legs—_

Rin's eyes flicker down. “Well... I still thought you were good. You had good endurance.”

“Thank you,” says Nitori, then hastily averts the conversation, “but you're on a totally different level, Rin-senpai. Maybe I'll write about you in my column one day.”

“Yeah,” says Rin, “maybe.”

When Nitori goes home, the restaurant seems very empty. But Rin is used to the quiet by now.

 

* * *

 

Haru looks very small in the center of the pool, treading water silently while Rin sends Neptune on a perimeter swim. To have brought the desensitization training this far in this amount of time is nothing short of amazing for a whale who probably never even saw a human until two weeks ago... which is why Rin is still cautious. Rei and Nagisa are both close at hand, though he doesn't know how much use they'd be, or even how much use _he'd_ be.

He blows his whistle. Neptune hears him and swims over to the slideout again, lifting his head out of the water near Rin's feet with his mouth open. He gives him a handful of fish and kisses him gingerly on the rostrum; then, after the whale swallows the fish and opens his jaws again, Rin slides his hand into his mouth and rubs his tongue. Neptune starts to close his mouth slowly and Rin removes his fingers with time to spare. Maybe he won't try tongue-tactile for a while again until he's been more desensitized. It's something to work on, anyway.

“Good boy. That's a good boy. Hey, you stay here with me for a little while.” The whale nuzzles his chest, prodding an old bruise, and Rin staunchly ignores it. “Haru, can you make some noise over there?”

Haru twists his arms this way and that against the water's surface, and when Neptune doesn't respond Rin keeps patting him. “You're a good boy. Who's a good boy? You wanna swim again? Okay. Let's go.”

He stands slowly, pointing the whale off in the appropriate direction and making the signal with his hands for the perimeter swim. Neptune obeys.

The exercise is very basic. Essentially, when the exercise is taught, the whale is instructed to swim around the pool while the trainers gradually introduce distractions. First a foot in the water, then a leg, and gradually a trainer or even more than one, until humans sharing the water is no longer a novelty. Today is the first time Rin has felt comfortable enough sending Haru all the way out into the center of the pool, and it's gone well. When they first started, Neptune was easily distracted by Haru in particular, but now he seems happy to just swim in his circle, his tail moving steadily.

Rin takes his eyes off the whale and turns it back to the man in the water. “Haru, come out now. Let's finish up and give him his fish.”

Haru starts to swim back toward the stage, but this time Neptune breaks from control and turns towards him. Rin tenses automatically, but the whale only approaches Haru slowly, keeping an almost polite distance in between them. He surfaces, whistles once, and bows back under the water, tucking his head under the man's stomach and nudging him around the pool slowly.

He sees Haru spit out some water as he regains his balance on the whale's nose. Neptune isn't being particularly lively with him; he's just keeping his face tilted up with Haru laying over his rostrum, and finally flicks his head to toss him up over his back. Haru lies between the animal's blowhole and dorsal fin, looking more confused than afraid. Rin, too, isn't sure what to think. This sort of behaviour isn't good, and it's the opposite of what they want out of a desensitization session, but everything seems to be happening above the surface and as far as he knows, Haru isn't badly hurt.

He slaps the water to recall Neptune to the stage, but there's no response. Instead he starts on another perimeter swim, Haru draped over his back like a doll, legs trailing in the water. Neptune whistles again, sounding pleased with himself, and slaps his tail contentedly against the surface.

Great.

“Haru, you can hear me, right?” Rin calls over the pool. When he sees him nod, he continues. “Don't move. You're not to reinforce him, understand?”

His plan is to pull Haru out when Neptune's perimeter swim reaches the stage again. But as if sensing this, the whale swerves just as he approaches the stage and swims across the pool instead. Rin has zero interest in this keep-away bullshit. He slaps the water again to try and regain Neptune's attention, but it seems to be a lost cause.

Nagisa moves closer and kneels beside him in the water, giving him an anxious look. It is to everyone's credit that nobody's panicked, even though Rei looks a little pale when Rin glances at him over his shoulder. He knows he has to make a decision fast; right now Neptune is swimming peacefully at the surface with Haru balanced securely over his back, but things could change at any moment.

“Get your dad and the rest of the dolphin trainers,” he says decisively. “I want nets and any other rescue equipment down here as fast as possible.”

“But Haru-chan—”

“Is fine, don't freak out. Let's just play it really safe, okay?” Nagisa doesn't move for a second, and Rin reaches over to pat him on the shoulder. “C'mon, off you go.”

The younger man looks at him for a while, as if awed. Rin gives him another push, and he exits the stadium as quickly as he can. The vet steps forward in his place.

“Rin-san, is there anything I can do?”

“Uh...” With Nagisa gone, Rin's unconsciously relaxed; when he'd been there, the fear of causing some sort of hysteria had been much greater for some reason. “Do... you have a cellphone? You could call for a paramedic.”

“A paramedic?!”

“Shh! Just in _case_ , you moron, don't shout!” Rin snaps.

Rei flusters, face flushing. “B-but _you're_ shouting!”

“Because I was telling your dumb ass _not_ to—” Halfway through his sassy retort, Rin realises his hypocrisy and zips his lip, letting out a long sigh instead. Behind him, Rei laughs nervously. Neptune, taking no notice of either of them, swims figure eights around the pool with Haru still lying on his back. It's just now that Rin notices him biting his lip and wincing slightly as the whale adjusts his position. That's not good. Could be nothing more than a bruise, or it could be a broken rib, a torn ligament...

“Haru,” he calls, as gently as he can, “are you okay?”

Haru nods as best he can. Neptune whistles again and starts to roll onto his side, leaving Haru with one hand gripping under the animal's flipper while most of his body slides into the water. Neptune corrects him, tilting his flipper to nudge Haru's hand away and flopping completely onto his back. It's a make or break moment, thinks Rin; if the whale becomes more passive, Haru could be out of the water in a few seconds. If he becomes more possessive, Haru could be dead in minutes.

Well, at least he can hear Rei's phone conversation with the paramedics. He keeps repeating what they're saying, probably for Rin's benefit, and it sounds as if they'll be just five minutes. That's enough, maybe. Probably. Hopefully.

“Haru,” Rin calls again. “Come back really slow, okay? Take it easy.”

Haru doesn't move. Rin sees him shifting around to lay his hands on the whale's body again to keep afloat, sees his lips moving.

“Haru, please don't touch him, just come here. Come on.”

What the fuck is he doing? Why isn't he getting out? He could even pull himself up on the stadium side and climb over the glass. Rin could go right over and pick him up.

Haru crawls up onto Neptune's stomach and kneels in between his flippers. He's wobbling, listing to one side.

“Haru, don't do that. Just get out of there. Haru, _now_.”

_Please. Baby, please._ He's having nightmare visions of Neptune rolling on top of him, swimming over him at the surface, several tonnes of muscle and bone crushing him back into the water. He's imagining Haru's arm snapping in the whale's jaws, his joints popping with the force of a blow—

The whale's tail moves very slowly as he ferries Haru along on his stomach. It nearly looks rehearsed even when Haru sinks into a lying position, his arms in line with Neptune's pectoral fins. Rin watches constantly for any telltale sign; a tilted fluke, a tensed muscle, but there's nothing. And maybe it all is _nothing_. He's paranoid. Stupid.

Neptune brings him back, in the end. He lies on his back near the edge long enough for Rin to take Haru by the arms and pull him up onto the slideout. Naturally, in the same second, Nagisa shows up with his father, five other trainers and two paramedics, all helping to carry a huge, tangled pile of safety netting.

Haru slumps quietly against Rin's chest, then pulls back. “Ow.”

“What? What is it? What's wrong with you?” Rin demands instantly, taking him by the shoulders and pushing him back to get a better look. “Are you hurt? Where?”

“I'm okay,” mumbles Haru.

“Haru.”

“My chest. It's fine.”

Rin ignores him and calls over the paramedics, who make their way over to the edge of the stage.

“Come on,” he says, helping Haru to his feet and leading him over. “Better safe than sorry.”

Neptune honks at them softly as they pass, leaning his chin on the slideout to watch the unfolding scene. While most of the trainers are exchanging confused whispers, Nagisa still looks somber... and his father seems less than happy. Rin hands Haru off to the medic and approaches him.

“Sorry. For all the fuss. I don't think he's too badly hurt, I was just—”

“Rin-ch—Rin was being careful,” Nagisa puts in, helpfully.

“I see that,” says the Director, gazing over at the whale, who ducks his head back under the water almost bashfully. “I'm just a little confused about what actually happened.”

Rin takes a breath to clear the tension from his chest. “We've been trying to desensitize Neptune to objects and people in the water. But he broke control during the session and wouldn't let Haru out of the pool. Since he's only just been captured and we don't know his temperament well, I thought it was better to be cautious, in case someone was hurt.”

“That makes sense.” Hazuki-san sighs heavily, then lets out a shaky laugh. “Thank goodness, though; when I saw the paramedics pulling up I thought for a moment someone had died.”

Nagisa laughs, too, but Rin just stares at them. He can't even pretend to find it funny. “Well, don't write it off as an option, maybe. If you want to be blunt about it, Neptune is just a four-tonne drowning hazard with teeth.”

“That's a little dark,” says the Director uncomfortably, before he straightens and places his hand on Rin's shoulder. “But you made a good decision. What would you recommend next?”

“I'd recommend...” Rin tries not to let his eyes travel back to Haru. He swallows. “No trainers in the water with Neptune, period. Teach him dry behaviours only—things you can control from the poolside. When he's more settled here, we could try getting back in the water with him slowly. And maybe...”

“Yes?”

Rin's next words feel like a betrayal. “I think we should train someone other than Haru. Nagisa, maybe, or one of the others.”

At that the Director's eyes widen. “What?”

“Neptune's possessive of Haru. In his first week he opened his mouth on him, and now this.” Rin averts his eyes. “It hasn't happened to me, or Ryugazaki, or anyone else who's interacted with him. I think—”

“Rin.” The Director cuts him off suddenly and takes him by the arm in the same moment. It's not a rough grip, but it's firm, and Rin senses something off by the way Nagisa immediately steps back. “Could you come with me for a minute, please?”

As the two of them head into the trainer's office, Rin sees Haru sitting with the paramedics, wetsuit rolled down to his waist. A yellowing bruise spreads wide across his sternum. He holds his breath.

“All right,” says the Director, closing the door behind them. “So; you think...?”

“Uh, sir—”

“Yes, I know. I've got something to say to you, too, but I'll let you finish your thought. You were saying it hasn't happened to anyone other than Haru. And you think—”

“I think their relationship is different,” Rin spits out. “Dangerous,” he adds, “I don't know.”

“Okay.” The Director folds his hands under his nose for a moment, taking a breath in as he gathers his thoughts. He even rocks back on his heels, a trait that—oddly—he seems to share with Nagisa. “I need to be very honest with you, Rin. I'm very proud of this aquarium, but it is not the sort of environment I'm sure you're used to.”

“I can see that,” says Rin. Then, quickly, “sir.”

“Don't worry, Rin, I'm not offended. In fact, I'm relieved it's you and not someone else from the city.” He turns to gaze out the window, where the paramedics are packing up and the trainers are gathering up the limp nets. “People from the big parks don't understand what we have to work with here. They tell us to renovate, to buy equipment, to change food plans, with absolutely no understanding of our budget. They send in trainers who treat the staff as if they're children who know nothing, and then get angry when nobody wants to listen to them.”

Rin's lip curls guilty. Had he done that? Probably. Well... definitely.

“We're different in Iwatobi,” says the Director resolutely. Outside, Rin sees Nagisa and Haru sitting on the bench together, talking, while Rei stands beside them, staring out over the pool where Neptune's dorsal fin looms out of the water. “In Iwatobi, we're family. My staff grew up together. They learned to swim in the same pools. They were friends. Some were even more than friends.”

Hastily, Rin turns his face away. The last thing he needs is to have _that_ sort of conversation with Nagisa's dad, but the man just laughs.

“Rin, it's fine. I know. I _know_.” When Rin looks back at him, he sees there really isn't a hint of mocking or resentment in the man's expression. “But it's why I have to ask you: is Haru really different, or is it just the way you look at him?”

“I...” Rin takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly through his nose. “No, it... it is different. I haven't seen a whale act like this before. And it really is only with Haru, sir.”

The man's smile fades. “Then I need to be honest with you again. We don't have anyone better than Haru here. Nobody's even close. You can see why I didn't want to say so in front of my children, of course, but it's hard fact. He's the strongest swimmer and the most consistent trainer on my entire payroll. What's more than that, the others respect him; even if he barely says a word, bless him. I _need_ him on this job, Rin.”

There's nothing he can say to that. In fact, now that it's been said, it all seems obvious. It should have been obvious from the moment he walked in the door.

“When you leave, I need my _best_ man heading the killer whale program. The park needs it, the people need it and I'm quite sure the animals need it, too. Am I wrong?”

“No, sir, you're not.”

“Oh, stop calling me 'sir', Rin, it makes me feel old.” He laughs, and pats him on the shoulder. “Listen. I understand what you're saying. I agree with you that we should be safety conscious at this stage, so stop all waterwork and keep everything dry for now. And how about in the next week, I pick another trainer to assign to Neptune as _well_ as Haru, at the very least?”

“Can I screen them, too?”

“Absolutely. I'll make a shortlist. It _is_ showbusiness, after all.” He winks jovially. “I'll make sure everyone gets it; what you say goes where Neptune is concerned.”

_But Haru is staying,_ thinks Rin, and the bruise flashes though his mind until the shape of it must be printed on the inside of his skull. “Understood.”

 

* * *

 

He tells Haru to go home. He tells him he'll take the night shift for once, that he doesn't need to worry, but nothing he says makes any difference. Haru just insists that he _has_ to stay, even when Rin tells him he should have gone home right after the incident in the first place. His bruise isn't as serious as it looks, although the paramedics evidently told him not to swim too much for a few days. He doesn't sound happy about that... but it's beside the point.

Enough is enough.

He takes Nitori's advice after all, and shows up at Iwatobi Aquarium on the stroke of midnight, determined to get to the bottom of things. After dark the place looks much less animated; the penguin and otter enclosures are almost totally silent for once, and the sea lions lie curled up like giant, smooth pebbles on their little island rather than swimming constant laps in the moat. There are no voices, no footsteps but his own, and only the dim glow of a few well-spaced lampposts lighting his way to the dolphin stadium.

Haru isn't there, and he doesn't see Neptune at the surface. It's possible he's just underwater, and the light is making it difficult to see him in one of the corners of the tank.

The dolphins start squeaking when they hear him and he tries to hush them as best he can. They fall quiet, but one of them seems to cock her head at him over the edge of the pool, as if to say, “Silly human!”

Rin doesn't have the time to be sassed by dolphins. He has to find Haru, and he might have already ruined the element of surprise. Kneeling to avoid being seen through the windows, he approaches the trainer's office, creeping slowly towards the door. From inside, he suddenly hears someone gasp.

“Haru, I'm so sorry! I didn't realise—”

Rin doesn't recognise the voice. It's not Haru, but who else could be here this late at night? If it's not a staff member, then Haru must have let them in. And why would—

“You didn't mean it.” There's Haru's voice, low and soft, barely distinguishable through the glass.

“But I did mean it. I wanted to play with you again—I just didn't know—”

_Play_ with him? Rin narrows his eyes. The hell?

“I'm not angry. It was a mistake.”

“Don't make excuses for me, all right? I should have been more careful. You're so small, so fragile, and I just... _forget_ , since we see each other like this, and... ”

Oh. Oh,  _now_ it makes sense. Haru didn't want to hurt his feelings, so he thought it would be better to meet his new boyfriend at the aquarium after hours. Fine. Whatever. Rin doesn't care. He  _doesn't_ . Haru can do whatever he wants with his stupid boyfriend. 

He should go home right now. Not home, though, not really; back to Haru's house where their memories still live on the walls and bookshelves, in every sunny photograph and stuffed animal he'd left behind all those years ago. He should go back now and act like he never heard this.

...Then again, this is totally a security breach. And since he doesn't want Haru to get in trouble over something stupid like this, it is totally his responsibility to get this douche—er, trespasser, to leave. So he steels himself, squeezes his eyes shut, and opens the door. 

Someone yelps. He hears a crashing noise. When he opens his eyes, Haru is lying on his back on the floor, shirt rolled up to his chest, with a naked man lying on top of him. A toppled chair lies beside them, along with a wool blanket loosely draped over the stranger's lower back. Haru gives him a wide-eyed look, but the other man hides his face in his shoulder.

“Rin, this isn't what it looks like.”

Oh, it isn't, is it? Because there are so many valid explanations for being found in one's workplace with a naked stranger on top of them. If Rin could just... but no, it's fine. He can handle this. He's an adult. He will take a breath, count to three, and  _politely_ ask the stranger to leave.

In three...

Two...

“What the _fuck_ is going on in here?!”

...One.

 


	6. Haruka

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I revised the scene plan for the chapters today and cut down the final number of chapters from 12 (counting prologue and epilogue) to 8. So with that change--OOOOOHHHHHHHH WE'RE HALFWAY THEEE-EERE WHOOOO-OA! LIIIIVIN ON A PRAAAAA-AAYER  
> Anyway, this is probably the longest chapter so far and has the most plot-stuff in it probably. Next chapter will be Rin again and there is plenty to reveal on his side also. 
> 
> **This time I'll be linking you to[Sha-Chi.org](http://sha-chi.jp/en/)!**  
>  As some of you might know, "shachi" is the Japanese word for "killer whale", and sha-chi.org is a Japanese site dedicated to information about the whales that have been captured and/or live in Japanese aquariums, as well as the whales that travel near the Japanese coast. Japanese aquaria have owned a rough total of 37 killer whales since the late 60's when killer whales were first displayed in marine parks, most of which were captured in the late 70's and early 80's; 7 survive today.  
> Did you know that one of the captive whales in Japan is actually called [Ran](http://www.orcahome.de/ran2.htm), just like Makoto's little sister? She even has a sister named [Rin](http://www.orcahome.de/rin.htm), who is just over one year old. Both live at the Port of Nagoya Public aquarium, the only Japanese park to have successfully bred killer whales (and actually the park I based Rin's workplace on in this story).
> 
> I'm sorry I've been taking a long time to update! This chapter was kind of a big one and took me ages, but hopefully next time I will be a bit faster.

Haru sits up. Makoto's face is still pressed into his neck, so he settles his hands on his shoulders and pushes gently to guide him away. Ignoring Rin's glare as best he can, he wraps Makoto's blanket around him again and presses down gently on his shoulder to keep him still.

He stands slowly.

“Well?” asks Rin.

“This is Makoto,” says Haru, unable to quite look at him. “The whale. I—”

“How stupid do you think I am, Haru?” Rin throws his hands up. “That's a man in a _blanket_.”

“No. It's Makoto.”

“I am,” says Makoto, clearly trying his best to contribute.

“I don't know who the fuck you are,” Rin says, bristling, “but can you put some damn pants on before you talk to me?”

Makoto stands up gradually in his weird, wobbly way, still clutching the blanket around him. Then he shuffles over to Haru and tucks himself behind him, making himself as small as possible. Haru can hear him shivering.

“Don't yell, Rin,” he mumbles. “He didn't do anything.”

“Didn't do—didn't do anything? Right. Sure. You two have just been in here _not doing anything_ for about two weeks now, huh?”

Haru blinks. Surely Rin hasn't guessed that much already? “How—”

“No. I don't want to hear it. I—” Rin falters, cutting himself off mid-sentence. He runs one hand up over his face, shaking his head. “I'll let you off this once. Just... take your boyfriend and get out before you get in trouble with security.”

...Wait. What?

“My boy... friend...?” repeats Haru haltingly.

Makoto bumps his chest against his back to get his attention and then bows his head down to whisper in his ear. “What's a 'boyfriend'?”

“I'll tell you later,” Haru tells him; unfortunately, Rin has overheard the exchange.

“You guys are laying it on pretty fucking thick, aren't you?” he snaps. “What is this? Do you think I'm dumb, Haru? Do you think I wouldn't notice? I _walked in on you_ and you're still trying to act like—wha...?”

A clicking noise from behind Haru interrupts him and he stares, dumbfounded, over his shoulder. It takes Haru a moment to turn his head, realising that the sound is coming from Makoto. He's taken a few steps back, squared himself, and is standing there with his mouth wide open, snapping his teeth together on thin air. His blanket is a thing of the past, and lies pooled around his feet on the floor, though he doesn't seem even slightly ashamed of himself.

Haru frowns. “Makoto...?”

“Fuck,” says Rin, exhaling heavily, “it is the whale. It is the fucking whale. He's fucking jaw popping at me. I can't fucking believe this.”

“Leave Haru alone,” Makoto says tremulously, between snaps. “We're podmates now. Don't shout at him.”

It's too late for Rin to be dealing with this, clearly. He lowers his hands and shakes his head. “Fine. Fine, okay, I get it. I'm not going to hurt him, okay?”

Makoto snaps his teeth together one more time for good measure. Haru chooses now to pick up his blanket again. It's not that he seems to care much about being naked, but _Rin_ certainly does. Anyway, he might get cold.

“I'm fine,” he tells him, patting his shoulder as he folds the blanket back around him. They'd tried the clothes, but Makoto still doesn't have his head around them. He'll wear a loose shirt without too much trouble, but pants seem to be a bit much to ask just yet.

“Oh...” Makoto smiles sheepishly. “That's all that matters, then.”

The haste with which Makoto attached himself to him, and the depth of his devotion already, unnerves him sometimes. It seems so innocent when he’s human, gripping his hand clumsily as he pulls him from the water, laying his head against his. Then he remembers how his forty long teeth had felt pressing through his wetsuit, and how the smallest flick of his head had sent him tumbling over his back.

Makoto had called that playing. Rin had called it lifethreatening.

Even so, looking at the whale in that pool is like standing at the edge of a tall, windy cliff; half of him is terrified of falling and the other half feels the suicidal urge to jump. What can he do? There's nobody to teach him. Even Rin has never been in a situation like this before... which clearly doesn't mean he'll take it lying down.

“You two. Sit down.” Rin's voice is low and Haru can hear him disconnecting himself uneasily from his words. He sits down on the couch and Makoto wobbles down next to him. The chair Makoto had been sitting on remains upturned on the floor in front of them, until Rin picks it up and sets it back down the right way, sitting across from them with his hands on his spread knees. “Explain. Now.”

Haru exchanges a glance with Makoto. He nods slowly. The most tactful way to put this is probably...

“It's magic.”

“I think the Ocean is angry,” adds Makoto, sadly.

Rin smacks the heel of his palm against his forehead and lets out a very long sigh. Haru can see him trying—and failing—to center himself. Rin had never liked change he wasn't prepared for, change he had no control over. It would take him a long time to come to terms with this, if he did it at all.

“If you're not screwing with me, then that pool has to be completely empty. We're going outside to look,” he says finally. Makoto sways nervously in his seat, and Haru wraps the blanket around him a little bit tighter once all three of them are standing. Once they're outside, Rin rolls up the legs of his pants and goes up onto the slide out, peering this way and that into the water. Haru just waits for him to figure it out, while Makoto shivers in his blanket, staring into the pool with an unreadable expression.

Haru says nothing. He knows what it means, of course; knows that Makoto shakes every night when he brings him back to the poolside and helps him into the water to transform again. To him it must be like suddenly ending up in the body of a baby, although Haru supposes that baby killer whales can swim just fine. He wants to teach Makoto to swim properly, but there's nowhere really safe for a beginner to practise at the park. The water's too cold, too, without a wetsuit, and he doubts it would be possible to easily find one in Makoto's size. He's never transformed at any time other than midnight, and only for about an hour, so it's not as if they can take him shopping. Surely the store would ask questions if a killer whale rolled up in their carpark looking for a wetsuit.

Makoto turns his back on the water, drops his blanket, and crouches down to pick it up again. When Rin comes back, he's kneeling on the ground with it draping lamely over his shoulders, looking phenomenally sorry for himself.

“Well,” says Rin. “I don't see a whale. And this guy is way too uncoordinated to be an actual human.”

Haru looks down at Makoto, who seems to be focussing deeply on rolling and unrolling his tongue repeatedly. He stops mid-roll, looking a little hurt by Rin's assessment, then carries on.

“He says it didn't happen before he came to the park,” says Haru, reaching down to help Makoto to his feet again. “He's not used to it yet.”

“Don't blame him, I guess.” Rin scratches the back of his head thoughtfully. He seems to have calmed down now, though he's still keeping a little distance between them. “This is still pretty hard to swallow. Um...”

He falls quiet for a while. Haru just stares at him and finally concedes, “Yes?”

“Can you pinch me? I'm not quite convinced.” He holds out his arm. Haru reaches out and pinches him gently. “Oh, come on, I hardly felt that.”

Haru pinches him again, tighter. This time Rin yelps and slaps his hand.

“Okay, okay! Geez. I still want to know more, though. Can I talk to him?”

“I don't know,” says Haru flatly, “can you?”

“You're a brat, you know? Fine. Ugh.” He steps away from him, turning on Makoto, who has stopped rolling his tongue and become fascinated with his fingers, holding one hand in front of him and wiggling them one at a time. “Hi. Neptune?”

Makoto's eyes drift up to him for a moment, then back to his fingers.

“Uh, Mister Whale? Excuse me?”

“Makoto,” Haru supplies. It's just like Rin to be dense in a situation like this.

“ _Sorry_. Makoto? Can I talk to you?”

“If you want to,” says Makoto, quietly, tucking his hand under the blanket again. He's still not making eye contact, Haru notices; maybe Rin had psyched him out with all his yelling earlier.

“I, uh... I do.” Rin sounds just as awkward, now, and Haru looks away from both of them out of consideration. “Look. I'm... sorry for shouting. Can you answer some questions?”

“I don't know,” admits Makoto. “I don't know about a lot of things, here. Haru helps me, but I—I hurt him. Then I heard how scared _you_ were and...”

Haru looks back at them. Rin's expression is softer now, and he's waiting patiently for him to continue. When he does, it's with a crack in his voice.

“... I'm so... bad at this. I just don't understand; when we're swimming, you give me fish if I don't touch him, but we always touch. You have to touch your pod. Have to touch them and—and listen to them, but... my pod is so far away that I can't hear their voices any more.”

His hands are clenching in his blanket and he's wobbling in place. As Haru watches, Rin takes a deep breath and lays his hand on his shoulder.

“Thank you for telling me. I didn't know that.” He looks over at Haru. “Shall we go back inside?”

Haru glances up at the clocktower again. 12:39am. “Fifteen minutes.”

“Until?”

“Until Makoto changes back. He usually knows.”

“How?”

Haru shrugs his head slightly and looks at Makoto for a response; he obliges quickly. “My senses start coming back. I can hear better again, but I can't do the other thing any more. Haru says it's called... 'smull'?”

“'Smell',” Haru clarifies. Makoto smiles.

“Ah, sorry. I'll remember now.” He stays close to Haru as they walk, rolling his shoulder against his arm. It's not so easy to keep his balance, but Haru manages at least until they get to the couch and sit back down, upon which Makoto lays his head on top of his and sighs. Rin gives them another odd look as he sits back down in the chair.

“So what's the deal? Really? Doesn't anyone know?” he asks tiredly.

“The Ocean is angry,” Makoto repeats, “I really think so.”

“Yeah?”

Against his shoulder, Haru feels Makoto fidgeting closer, one of his hands finding purchase in his shirt. He sees Rin's eyes flicker toward it, too. “My mother used to say that we were the Ocean's favourite children. That's why she made us strong and fierce like her, and made so many other creatures for us to eat.”

His hand starts to trail circles on Haru's stomach through his shirt. Haru can practically feel Rin bristle from a metre away, but he closes his eyes and listens.

“The Ocean always gives us what we're strong enough to take. But if we're arrogant, and overestimate ourselves, then she'll punish us, too. That's why you have to be careful, always. Maybe—” He sighs, and Haru feels his breath parting his hair from where his head lays against his. “Maybe I'm like this because she doesn't want me any more.”

He sits up slowly, and Haru feels the warmth at his side fading.

“Uh...” Rin hesitates, rubbing his temples. “I'm sure it's not... look, uh, it's not your fault. This is just... oh, man...”

It's good of Rin to try in a situation like this, especially when sensitivity is certainly not his strongest suit. Unfortunately, it isn't Haru's either.

“If you didn't do anything, then the Ocean can't be angry with you.” It hits him, then; of course _Makoto_ hasn't done anything wrong, but perhaps... he meets Rin's eyes.

At first, he frowns as if Haru's accused him, but then it dawns on him as well, and he lets out his breath very slowly. “Yeah. Uh. Maybe... the Ocean is trying to get _us_ to understand. Or... or something. Damn it, this is such sappy bullshit. I should have just gone to bed.”

Makoto's blinking up at him, and presently he holds out one of his arms towards Rin. When he doesn't reach back, Makoto leans forward and rubs the back of his hand against his knee. “Thank you. You're Rin?”

“No,” groans Rin, slumping in his chair, “I'm the king of all idiots. What am I doing here?”

“Your Highness,” mutters Haru, but when Makoto enthusiastically copies him (“Highness!”) he decides it's probably better to set him straight. “No. He's Rin.”

“All right.” Makoto smiles shakily again. “That's... good. You can be in our pod, too. It's quite small, and we don't have any mothers or sisters, but th-that's all right. When Haru finds Ran and Ren, we...”

“Makoto,” Haru chimes in gently. Rin isn't saying anything, but he can tell he's starting to boil over again. It's not his fault, of course; anyone would be overwhelmed. “That's enough for now. We should go out and get ready.”

Perhaps it's that his hearing is starting to come back—he always understands Haru best right at the end, right before the call of the water seems to drown out everything else—but he doesn't argue. In these moments he understands without speaking, and speaks very little himself. Haru sees him looking over at Rin with a faint frown.

 _What does he hear in his Voice?_ Haru wonders, but it's not for him to know.

“Yes. I want to go,” says Makoto distantly, staggering to his feet. Haru keeps at his side, walking him carefully to the door. Rin only watches at first, then follows behind slowly.

As they look into the water, Makoto's shiver comes back. He could just be cold; it may be summer, but the water isn't warm and he no longer has his blanket to protect him. Haru sits down on the edge of the slideout and Makoto comes to him, holding both his hands in his. Rin wades out after them, sitting down next to Haru with his elbows on his knees.

Makoto lowers himself down into the water properly. Haru keeps hold of his hands. As always, he doesn't know what to say; so he thinks, as firmly as he can. _I'll find them. You'll be together again one day. I'll try—if I can—no, I have to—I will—I mean—_

He sees Makoto's head tilt. His lips are a little blue. “Haru?”

“It's almost time. Should I let go?”

The hands in his squeeze tighter. “No, please. I can't—please.”

“You could hold onto the edge if you're scared,” Rin tells him, in as sympathetic a tone as he can manage.

Makoto's eyes widen. “I'm not strong enough.”

Rin looks up and down his arms. Haru can already tell what he's thinking; Makoto's human form is actually very well built, but that's no use when he doesn't even know how to use it. He barely manages to tread water, which isn’t reliable in a pool this deep anyway. Haru opens his mouth to tell him to let it alone, but Rin suddenly strikes from an angle neither of them seem to be expecting. “That's because you don't trust yourself.”

“It's not my body—”

“It is, for now. And you have muscles—” He reaches out to touch his bicep, making him tense. “—that will help hold you up. Haru, how long?”

Haru looks up at the clocktower. “Less than a minute.”

“Okay. Let's practise just once, tonight. Give me your hands?” Rin holds out his own, palm up. Makoto looks up at Haru anxiously. After a moment's hesitation, he gives him the nod, and guides his hands into Rin's carefully.

Rin is probably better at this than him. Rather than teaching Makoto to solve his problem, Haru had just tried to stop him from having to deal with it, but Rin kneels down in the shin deep water—fully dressed—and helps the whale guide his elbows onto the slide out, spreading them apart for him with his hands in the middle. “Press with your hands. With these, like this.”

“Like this?” Makoto pulls himself a shaky centimetre more above the water, Rin still holding him under the elbows.

“There you go, good job. Is it hard?”

“No...”

“Can you get here by yourself?”

“Haru made a device for me. When it's almost time, it makes a noise, and I swim up onto the—” His voice shorts out, like Haru knew it was going to—he'd also noticed the colour of his eyes changing, even from a few feet away—and he slips from the slideout under the water. Rin jerks forward, but Haru knows they can only wait now. The water glows white with moonlight, and in a few moments Makoto resurfaces, exhaling roughly from his blowhole and bobbing up beside them in the dark. Haru chooses now to join Rin on the slideout again, reaching out his hand and waiting for Makoto to touch it with his nose.

“I'll see you soon,” he says, when the whale bumps up against it, rubbery skin slick against his. “Understand?” Makoto squeaks once in response. Haru takes that for a yes, and rubs his nose.“Goodnight.”

“'Night,” Rin echoes, though he doesn't touch him. They stand slowly, and Makoto props his chin up on the edge of the slideout to watch them go.

 

* * *

 

The trip home is a lot quieter and more awkward than Haru could have anticipated... not that he had anticipated the situation in the first place. By the time they get back to the house, Rin still hasn't said anything so Haru doesn't, either. It feels like all the sound in him has died away in confusion, in doubt, in _fear_ that there is no way, no way in the world that he can keep the promises he's made to Makoto... and that now, there's a witness to it all as well. Surely it should have become easier once someone else knew about the whale's secret; instead, Haru only feels guilty.

He makes for the stairs as soon as they're inside, but Rin calls out to him when he's halfway up. “So when were you planning to tell me?”

Haru falls still. He opens his mouth, but no sound comes out. Of course he'd known Rin would find out eventually, but part of him had hoped he would just mind his own business until he'd figured something out. That was a long shot, he supposed.

“Haru. _When_ were you going to tell me?”

He swallows. “I had it under control.”

“You had a four-tonne animal in a human body practically clinging all over you. That pool's almost eight metres deep and he can't even swim.” Rin follows him up the stairs and stands so close Haru can feel the breath rushing from his lips. “ _Were_ you going to tell me? Tell _anyone_?”

Haru looks away.

“Did you think you could just stay there until one o'clock in the morning every night for the rest of his life and go to work at six the next day? You'd _kill_ yourself! What was your plan, Haru? What were you thinking keeping all of that to yourself?”

 _That I was the only one who could help,_ Haru thinks. How wrong he'd been. How stupid. Now that Rin says it out loud, it's all so obvious. He couldn't have done all that _and_ helped Makoto find his family, _and_ found some way to get him all the way back to the other side of the country to put him as close to his capture location as possible. How could he do any of that? He can't even talk to Rin, who still—after _ten empty years—_ knows him better than anyone. Anyone human, at least. He'd felt Aiko had understood him, when they'd swam together with her matching her pace to his, when they'd splashed each other in the med pool after examinations, when she'd looked into his eyes and closed her blowhole and—

“Look at me, Haru,” says Rin, lowly. “Look at me.”

“I thought I could handle it,” he whispers, and doesn't turn around.

“You _idiot_ ,” snaps Rin, and closes the gap between them with a firm hug from behind. Haru's bruises sing harshly against his forearms, but he doesn't pull away. “You damn idiot. You could have ruined yourself. You could have—I just—”

Haru feels himself being turned around. He supposes the trend of them not looking at each other at all during these sorts of conversations is over.

“I know I've been kind of on edge, but I really wanted you to trust me through all this. That's why when I didn't know, and I thought—I thought you just didn't want to see me, or that there was something... I don't know.” Rin shakes his head, and looks up at him steadfastly from the step just below him. “Please be honest with me from now on, okay? I'll _help_ you, I will, just... please.”

Haru lowers his gaze again. The easiest thing to do would be to just say 'yes'—to accept Rin completely, as he has before—but his body won't listen to him. In the end, he manages a tiny nod.

Rin looks crushed. But Haru is used to disappointing him, to hurting him in ways he doesn't even understand. His sympathy is sincere, but useless.

“Haru,” he says, softly. “I was just worried. Haru, I still—”

“We're not together, so it’s not your problem,” says Haru, as coldly as he can. He understands this much: hurting Rin a little now is better than hurting him a lot later, once his feelings have already grown well out of control.

“I know that,” mutters Rin, turning his face away. Haru can hear the lump in his throat as he pushes past him up the stairs to the spare room. “Just get some sleep, then. See you in the morning.”

“Goodnight,” says Haru. When Rin closes the door, he sinks down onto the stairs, head bowing down against his knees.

 _Aiko. Makoto. Rin._ All of them had entrusted themselves to him, in one way or the other. He'd already let one slip out of his reach, and it's becoming even more of a struggle to keep the other two above the water. Perhaps he'll sink before he does anything good for anyone. Perhaps, in the end, nobody will need him at all.

 

* * *

 

Rin won't look at him the next morning.

 _Good,_ Haru tells himself. But the prickles of guilt in his chest turn to deep, gouging stabs by the time they reach the aquarium; how has he not noticed how tired, how sad Rin looks these days? He'd taken note of it when they'd first seen each other again, but ever since meeting Makoto and losing Aiko he's simply been too overwhelmed to notice.

Was he too hard on him? All he did was tell him they weren't together any more, which was true. He hadn't said anything more than that. There'd been no 'go away' or 'I don't care about you'; but Rin had always found those sorts of things in his silences, even when Haru had tried his hardest to convince him of the opposite.

When they'd separated, he'd really thought it was for the best. Time apart would give them space to grow up, to think about what they were to each other and what, perhaps, they should be. Watching Rin now, he starts to feel like they're going backwards. It's not entirely Rin's fault either. With all that's going on, Haru finds the idea of returning to simpler, happier times more and more attractive—but he shouldn't do that to him. Rin needs someone who can help him move forward, not bog him down in his highschool days, achieving nothing.

At least Makoto looks happy to see both of them this morning. He coos and splashes them with one of his pectorals, then rolls over on his back, blowing bubbles, and _finally_ floats with his chin up by the slideout to be fed. Haru sees Rin's hands hovering an awkward inch away from the whale's skin and twitching back slightly each time he makes contact.

“You can still touch him like before,” he says.

“Before I didn't—” Rin sighs. “I didn't see him like _that_.”

Haru pours half a bucket of mackerel into the whale's open mouth. “So what?”

“I used to _kiss_ him,” says Rin, sounding horrified.

 _You used to kiss me,_ thinks Haru, but keeps it to himself. “I don't think he cares. He licks my face sometimes.”

Rin wrinkles his nose. “While he's a person? That's _gross_. Did you tell him?”

“No. It's fine. He's a whale then, too.” Haru rubs Makoto's eyepatches, and the whale whistles at him fondly.

“Still, you shouldn't teach him bad manners,” Rin grumbles, as Makoto turns to him and nudges his knee. Suddenly, he flinches hard and pulls back, dragging himself to his feet. “Ugh—is that all the fish?”

“I think so.” Haru shows the empty bucket to Makoto, who turns over on his side slightly, gazing up into it with one blue-green eye. But Rin is already starting to wade back off the slideout. “Let's clear out, then. I have to write up a report. I was meant to do it last night but—well, you know.”

“Oh.” Haru looks over his shoulder at him, then back to Makoto slowly. They've barely spent any time at all with him this morning... but if Rin isn't here, then the new safety protocols say he can't be by the pool at all. He'll have to find a new spotter, if nothing else. Setting the bucket aside, he leans over and wraps his arms around as much of the whale's head as he can, giving him a quick squeeze. It's easier to do this with an animal than a person, he thinks. Animals don't hug back, or squeeze too tight for him to get away. Usually. “I'll see you later, Makoto.”

He follows Rin's lead in standing and backing slowly off the slideout. Makoto gives a long exhale, almost like a sigh, spyhopping out of the water to watch them go.

Rin is off practically the second Haru's clear of the pool, making a beeline for the trainer's lounge and closing the door promptly behind him. Haru tells himself he understands and that it doesn't hurt. He tells himself he doesn't have a right to hurt, especially when he's been doing the same thing to Rin ever since he arrived.

Passing the dolphin pool on his way to the vet's office, he spots Baby logging listlessly in the water. Like an old injury in the cold, dread creeps back into his heart; there's no way to tell if she's ill or just resting from this distance, and some weak, pathetic part of him feels too afraid to even check. Still, he kneels by the pool and slaps the water, and she and the other dolphins surge over to assess him as usual. Only the two new additions, brought in to replace Koemi and Aiko, stay where they are, watching warily from their respective corners of the pool. Their names are Mimi and Kou—it had been Nagisa's suggestion to name a dolphin after Rin's little sister, and Rin had even seemed quietly pleased about it—but neither of them are used to humans yet. Haru used to like working with the more difficult animals, actually—still does—but these two aren't his responsibility any more.

He lifts his hand above Baby's head to give her a “target”, and the dolphin readily bumps it with her nose. She's probably fine. Just like Aiko was fine just hours before dying in his arms. Just like Koemi was the night before they found her dead, too. If he's paranoid lately, at least it isn't completely without reason.

In the end it takes him more than five minutes to stand and complete his trip to the vet's office. When he gets there, Ryugazaki is just on his way out of the morgue shed next door, carrying several weighty boxes. There's no need to ask what they contain.

“Ah, Nanase-san, I'm sorry! I was just about to take this to the truck...”

“Is this Aiko?” Haru asks quietly.

Ryugazaki lowers his gaze. “Um... some of her. I already took most of it down. The rest is Koemi.”

“All right.” Haru doesn't have to look inside the box to know there's nothing in it that resembles a dolphin any more, so in some ways it's hard to explain why he's sad. It's not as if he's never seen anything like it; the pilot whales were transported like this, too, after their death, though apparently it had taken much longer to cut them up and get them into the biohazard bags. Seals and penguins died all the time. They'd even lost dolphins before; there'd been a pair of Risso's dolphins who'd lasted less than two months not long after Haru was first hired, and one of the bottlenose group—the only male, who Director Hazuki had hoped might pioneer a breeding program—had died just five years ago when a gate closed on his back by accident.

Haru's been here a long time, and death is as much a part of the lifestyle as fish and backflips. It's not that he never cared before, either, but Aiko had been special. She was one of the oldest animals in the park; the most experienced performer; the pod's matriarch and, more than that, his friend. All of the dolphins had been his friends, but since Makoto's arrival and Aiko's death, they've started to feel like strangers. He's not even as affected by Koemi's death as he might have been. Losing Aiko had been a sharp, ragged stab to the heart, but hers feels more like the numb sting of losing a distant relative; someone he hasn't seen or spoken to in years, even though he still saw her every day. Maybe it will hit him later.

“Would you like to come down with me? I—to say goodbye, I mean...” Ryugazaki adjusts the boxes in his arms. They look heavy. Haru wants to offer to help carry them, but his lips freeze.

“Mm.” He looks away. “I was going to ask you something, anyway.”

“Of course! Just give me a moment.” They walk at the vet's pace, pausing occasionally for him to correct his grip. Haru finds himself thinking that death is a very strange thing. A few weeks ago, the slabs of meat in those boxes had swam beside him as agile and graceful as birds in the sky, but now they may as well be gravel from the walkways, or waste from the park's bins.

“You were at the capture, weren't you?” he asks finally. “For Neptune.”

“Oh? That's right, I had to. Nagisa-kun was there, too, on behalf of his father, but he didn't really come down on the beach until the end.”

Haru blinks. “Why?”

“Oh, because the other parks had first choice. I was only there from the start because they needed more vets, but I... stayed out of the water, anyway.” Ryugazaki swallows and looks away. “I actually can't swim. I know it's weird.”

 _What are you doing working with animals who live in the water, then?_ Haru thinks of saying; but something else has caught his attention. “Why did they need vets?”

“Well, an older female was struck by a boat when they were bringing the pod into the cove. They wanted to see if they could save her, but she died at the scene.”

 _Makoto's mother._ Haru feels coldness seeping through his stomach. “What happened then?”

“I don't know. The fishermen towed her away with a boat before the trainers came down. I... they probably thought it would send the wrong message. Still, the other animals were quite distressed. It took a really long time to get anyone in the water.” They reach the loading zone, where Ryugazaki pauses in his retelling to drop off the boxes in the back of a waiting truck.

“How many whales did they take?”

“I think it was six. Two males counting Neptune, a female and three calves. But I heard the other male died not long after he was transported.” Ryugazaki lowers his arms to his sides, bowing his head. “Honestly, I... I felt really terrible for them. When they were towing the female away, they sounded like they were screaming. There were other animals outside the net who followed the boat, but they came back later and stayed there by the others, almost... almost as if they were consoling them. It's very unscientific, I know.”

“They're not very scientific,” says Haru, thinking of Makoto and how he talks about the Ocean having feelings and cries whenever he mentions his siblings.

“I suppose not. They're only animals, after all.” The vet glances back at the truck for a moment. “Still, they are rather special, even when you're used to them. I can see why some people used to think they were magic, even as a scientist.”

Haru follows his gaze into the truck, where Aiko and Koemi are lying inside frozen bags, packed up in innocuous white boxes. Then he turns away, staring back in the direction of the pools. “Where did the other whales go? The ones that were captured?”

“I can't remember right now, but I could look it up for you. Why do you ask?”

“For a friend.” He keeps his face turned away. “He wants to see them.”

“Really? Is he from out of town?”

“Yes,” says Haru, without thinking about it. It's technically true, anyway. “Could you come and tell me when you find out?”

Ryugazaki closes the truck door. “Of course. Will you be here tonight?”

“Sure.”                                         

“I'll find you, then.” He smiles. “See you later.”

 

* * *

 

“This is where they are.”

Makoto squints at the piece of paper. “What do these symbols mean?”

“That's writing. They're the names of the aquariums—the places like this—where your family is.” Haru points at the image underneath, which the vet had helpfully produced and printed off for him. “And this... is Google Maps. It shows the locations of the parks as well.”

Makoto takes the paper from his hands and holds it reverently before his face.

“Thank you, Google Maps,” he says softly. He stares at it for a while, puzzling it out, then looks over at him again. “Do the colourful stingrays show you each place?”

Haru hesitates. “The what?”

“These markings that look like stingrays with black spots on their backs. Is that how you know where it is?”

“Oh. Yes.”

“Amazing,” says Makoto, staring back down at the paper. A few moments later, “But I still don't really know how to tell what this means.”

“You've got the idea,” says Haru, taking the sheet off him. “The blue part in the picture is the sea, and the brown and green part is the shape of the land. And the... stingrays are pointing to different places on the land.”

“So, how far away are we from the stingrays?” asks Makoto anxiously.

“Most of them are on the other side of the country. So if we're about here—” He points to the general location of Iwatobi on the map, then drags his finger across to the other side of the country, where the closest marker lies near the capture site in Wakayama. “—the closest is this far away.”

Makoto frowns, and trails his finger around the coastline. “You'd have to swim for a long time to get over there. Is it faster on land?”

“Yes, but... I don't think I could take you there. It would take too long, and you'd have to change back, wouldn't you?”

“I know, but... isn't there a way? You got me here, didn't you? In that—that cave.” Makoto cringes. “It was like a cave, but it was moving around... i-it was horrible, but if it was for my family—”

Haru cuts him off hastily. “I can't do that by myself.”

“Then could someone help you? Will Rin help you?”

He hesitates. Rin had gone home early after barely speaking a word to him all day, and he's been off since last night. It's not even that he's sulking; he just seems exhausted, crushed under the weight of something he refuses to identify. Haru shakes his head. “Even if he will, it's not enough. You need a lot of people to organise a thing like that.”

“Like when you eat a whale together with your pod?”

“…Sure.”

“All right. I suppose our pod isn't big enough yet.” Makoto sighs, shoulders slumping. But he picks up the paper again and keeps gazing down at it, his index finger trailing between the coloured markers. “Do... do you know anything else about the others? Are they okay?”

A pause.

“No,” he admits, reluctantly. “One of them is dead. An adult male. I don't know anything else.”

The paper slips out of Makoto's hands. Haru's started to notice that he doesn't use his extremities when he's focussed on his family. Maybe it makes him feel more like a whale. Maybe he simply doesn't have the will, faced with such despair.

“My uncle,” he whispers. “When Grandmother died, he was so sad—he came and lived with us, and Mother looked after him instead—he just needed a pod to swim with. He needed—”

Suddenly, he stops, eyes widening with horror.

“Did they take him to the Ocean? Did he die in the Ocean?”

“I don't know.” Haru's voice feels small and useless. “I don't think so. We've never done that at this aquarium.”

Makoto gasps, and the breath takes him to his feet. “But... you have to be in the Ocean! When you die, you _have_ to be in the Ocean. Otherwise, how will your pod find you? All your parents and their parents and their parents' parents—”

He starts to sob halfway through. Haru doesn't know what to do with someone standing in front of him, naked and crying and wobbling on unsteady legs. He wants to tell him something that will make it all better. Again, his lips won't move. They never do when he needs them to.

Makoto looks at him helplessly, and he has a thought. There might be nothing he can say, but there could be something he can _do_.

“Makoto,” he says, “could we try putting clothes on you one more time?”

Right now, it seems like he's too shell-shocked to even protest. Haru helps him dress, guiding him through the arm and leg holes and pulling his shirt down for him when he's finished. At first, he'd compared this to helping his grandmother towards the end of her life... but now it doesn't really seem like that. Makoto isn't incapable, and he hasn't forgotten how; he's honestly never learned. He supposes he couldn't expect him to understand how to wear clothes any more than he could expect him to know the capital of America (which, come to think of it, Haru isn't sure he knows either). Makoto isn't simple—not at all—but this world isn't his. All things considered, he's figured out a lot.

When they're done, Haru walks him out of the office and out of the stadium entirely. As they're passing the sea lions, Makoto pulls away from him and leans over the rail to investigate. “I thought I heard these just after I arrived. I haven't had one in months... oh, they're my _favourite_...”

“We don't eat them,” says Haru, quickly. Makoto's face, already flushed from tears, goes darker with embarrassment.

“Y-you don't? Then why are they here?”

Haru pauses. “So people can look at them.”

“What a waste,” laments Makoto, and stares back down at the sleeping animals.

Haru isn't sure if he should just leave him there in case the park ends up minus a sea lion, but he supposes that in his human form there's probably not a great chance of him managing to actually eat one. So, while Makoto gazes longingly into the enclosure, he rummages in his pockets, finds some change, and gets him a snack from the nearest vending machine before going back to collect him.

“This is chocolate,” he explains, as they keep walking. “You eat it.”

He hands it to him, and Makoto tilts his head, lifting the packet to his mouth and licking the foil.

“Oh, it's lovely,” he says politely, handing it back immediately. “Why don't you have it?”

“You take this off first,” says Haru, peeling off the wrapper for him and pressing it into his hand again. “Try now.”

Makoto gapes at him. “You skinned it so easily.”

“It didn't fight back,” he says flatly. “Go on.”

Makoto lifts it to his mouth again and presses his tongue against it. This time, the flavour hits him and his eyes widen; he nips off a piece of chocolate with his teeth and just holds it in his mouth, closing his eyes. “It's _nice_. I don't taste things like this, normally. Do you think it's because taste and smill are quite similar?”

“Yes,” says Haru. “Taste and smell. Are you going to chew it?”

“'Chewit'?” Haru can see the melting chocolate jostled by his tongue as he speaks. “I'm sorry... show me?”

The chewing lesson doesn't end up taking long. By the time Makoto has figured it out, they've reached their destination; the lookout at the high end of the park. Makoto almost drops his chocolate in his rush to the rail.

“Is... is this what it looks like from the land?” he gasps.

“Yes,” says Haru, “that's the sea.”

For some time, Makoto just stands there practically bent over the rail, until eventually Haru gets a little nervous and pulls him back. There are tears on his face and his chocolate is melting messily in one hand, forgotten. “When I heard it, I thought I was just losing my mind.”

“No,” says Haru, “it's right here.”

“Just look—look out there under the sky. It's so big you can't even see the end. Isn't it just the most amazing—” He shakes his head. “All this time. All this time it was so close.”

Haru gives him a moment. Then he taps his shoulder gently. “I'm sorry about your uncle. And your mother. I'll try my best with the others.”

“You're already the best,” says Makoto, straightening up again and flopping against him for one of his awkward hugs. “You do so much for me.”

He licks his forehead, which Haru assumes is now covered in chocolate. But it's a small price to pay, especially when he knows he doesn't do nearly as much as Makoto says. Would Makoto feel this way if he weren't in such a desperate situation? Would he feel this way if there were someone—Rin or anyone else—who really could do more for him than Haru?

“It's almost time for you to go back,” he says, closing his eyes. “We can come back tomorrow, if you want to.”

Makoto finishes his chocolate as they walk back to the pool in near silence, where he undresses and climbs reluctantly back into the water as usual. “This is so still, compared to the Ocean. If I was there, I probably couldn't—”

“That's enough,” says Haru, as gently as he can, and Makoto holds his hands tight. “Do you want to try what Rin showed you?”

“Not tonight,” he says shakily, “I don’t feel well.”

There’s no reason to push him, especially not now. Haru squeezes his fingers lightly.

“You won’t let me die like that, right, Haru?” Makoto looks up at him, a nervous smile stretching his face. “You said you’ll take me back to the Ocean. If you can.”

“I did. I promised.” Haru closes his eyes. He wants to keep holding Makoto up, but he feels so heavy all of a sudden. “You’re going to go home.”

“With my family,” Makoto sighs. “My family.”

He slips so easily from Haru’s hands when it’s time. Haru finds himself thinking, hazily, that he wants to fall in after him.

 

* * *

 

The living room is empty when he gets home that night, and Rin's laptop is lying closed on the bench as he passes the kitchen, the light by the charger port blinking slowly. The door to the spare room is closed, but Haru stands beside it until he hears the faint rustle of Rin stirring in his sleep. For some reason, he’d been afraid he might disappear.

“I'm not coming with you today,” Rin tells him the next morning. “I told your boss yesterday. I've got an appointment.”

“Okay,” says Haru. He can feel the silence hanging around them like a thick mist, cold and clammy against his skin. It stays sticking to him all the way to work, where it’s finally replaced by a drier, sharper cold as the vet pulls him aside at the door to the stadium. Behind him, over by the pools, he can see Nagisa on one of the spotter’s benches, his head in his hands.

“Nanase-san, it’s bad. I have Aiko’s test results back. They’re not good and we—we just lost Baby, too.” Haru stares. He continues. “The fungal infection that killed the pilot whales? It’s affecting the dolphins too. Perhaps the tank wasn’t cleaned thoroughly enough after we emptied it—maybe they were exposed some other way—I don’t know. But every dolphin that’s been in contact with Aiko, Koemi or Baby could be at risk.”

Time seems to slow as the realisation strikes him, blunt and deliberate. “What about Makoto—Neptune?”

Rei glances back over his shoulder at the show pool, where Makoto is peering up at Nagisa over his ledge. “I couldn’t say—we don’t have all the equipment to run a full physical, either—but… if there were sick animals in the show pool, then… we should assume he was exposed, too.”

 _I don’t feel well,_ he’d said. And Haru had said… nothing. He’d done nothing.

_You won’t let me die like that, right, Haru?_

Haru thinks of Aiko’s blowhole closing, and the white boxes, and Nagisa crying, and Makoto’s green eyes in the moonlight. He thinks of how he’d thought the pool still looked a little green before they filled it up again. He thinks of every time he’d touched the dolphins, then Makoto right after; thinks of how he’d held Aiko’s dead body in his arms just before he’d gotten into the med pool with him.

 _I promised,_ he thinks, every step towards the pool heavy as a soul in the palm of his hand.


	7. Rin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi again! idk why this update came so quickly! It's weird, because I think it is also the longest chapter so far. It might be because we are coming into the last arc of the story, which just happens to be the part I have planned in the most detail. I swear to you all, you will never see this ending coming so I'm not saying a word about it from this moment onwards hahaha.
> 
> I noticed that the last chapter sucked, and I wondered why. I read it again and realised Nitori wasn't in it and that must have been it, so Nitori is in this chapter more than ever to make up for it. Also featured is his BFF, Keiko, who is named after the whale who played Free Willy, who was later rehabilitated and released into the wild in real life! Idk why he was called Keiko though since it's actually a female name. Nitori's Keiko is a girl, so it's just a tiny little nod to whale!Keiko. P:
> 
> **Since we've mentioned Keiko, I'll link you to[his website](http://keiko.com/), as well as his page on the site for the documentary [A Whale of a Business](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/whales/keiko/), which followed the early stages of his release.**  
>  While many debate whether or not Keiko's release was successful (he never found his wild family or reintegrated with another pod, and he was free just a few years before succumbing to pneumonia), his is an interesting case to consider when talking about releasing captive killer whales.   
> I should mention, though, that his rehab and release cost millions of dollars and required the kind of specialist care and equipment that has never been devoted to a single whale before or since, largely due to his celebrity status after _Free Willy_. The Iwatobi Aquarium, for example, probably couldn't even afford a fraction of it.

Rin hates hospitals.

He hates the sickly-pale walls and the unimposing music and the tired-looking nurses floating between the rooms. He hates doctors with cold hands and bored voices feeling his legs and making disapproving sounds. He hates phrases like “cartilage destruction” and “permanent damage” and “loss of mobility”.

He watches the clock and nods tiredly. Says, “yes, sir”. Takes a new knee support and a prescription for stronger pain-killers. Thinks about his college swim-team grooming them all for the Olympics. Thinks of seeing the whales for the first time at Tokyo Ocean Adventure. It had been just Calypso that day, and he’d thought she was male. He hadn’t known anything about those animals back then.

He remembers hearing about the job opening in the dolphin stadium. Someone had suggested it to him; he doesn’t remember who. He’d thought he would need a marine biology degree, but they’d said something about it being more about your personality and your physical condition.

(“Your physical condition is…”)

He got out of the water after his swim trial and had a microphone pushed into his hands. He doesn’t even remember what he’d said, only that his attitude had made the interviewer laugh and slap him on the shoulder. They’d called him back the next day. He hadn’t known until much later that Haru had been picked up by the Iwatobi Aquarium around the same time.

The first dolphin he swam with was called Haruka. A female, unlike his Haruka.

(Not his Haruka. He has to keep reminding himself.)

She was quiet and patient with him, but he remembers thinking she looked sad. He’d forgotten about that until right now. Why is it only now that he thinks she looked sad?

They moved him up to work with the killer whales just one year later. At first he thought he’d been demoted; all of the fish-handling and bucket scrubbing and standing on the show stage doing next to nothing while the other trainers swam. When he did get in the water, it was with Calypso first; the smallest and gentlest of the whales. All he’d done was kneel on her back behind her blowhole and ride around the edge of the pool.

A few years later he was doing foot-pushes across the stage and rocket hops off Atlas’ nose. A few years after that, he was taken down by Atlas during a training session, yanked by the foot.

He’d felt all right. Figured the bruising was normal, that the pain would fade like any other sports injury. He hadn’t wanted to admit it. Hadn’t wanted to admit that he was out of his depth, that it was not _possible_ to _not_ be out of his depth with these animals, not ever.

He’d stayed off waterwork for a while and his manager had understood. But when the pain didn’t go away, he knew something wasn’t right. In the end, he learned he had waited too long. The doctors had said the damage in his knees wasn’t linked to a single injury; it was cumulative. Foot pushes; stand-ons; rocket hops; all of the incredible stunts he’d learned to excite the crowds had been betraying him all this time.

Gou had said something once about ballet dancers having short, beautiful careers. Rin doesn’t want a short, beautiful career. He wants something that lasts forever, something that won’t leave him lying cold and alone at night, something that means _something_.

Instead he has this. Instead he has pain and regret and medication and monthly appointments at the local hospital.

And Rin hates hospitals.

 

* * *

 

Nitori comes over to Haru’s place around lunch time to show him his articles on the park. Rin had forgotten they’d organised that, to be completely honest, and he almost wishes he’d cancelled; but Nitori’s so excited to show him that it’s hard to feel annoyed.

“With this one they told me, ‘we’ll print it in black and white’ and I said, ‘why?’ and my boss said, ‘well, the whale’s black and white, isn’t it?’ but _I_ said, ‘what about the water? What about the trainers? You’d be missing out on _so much_ ’. So there it is: full colour.”

“It’s good,” Rin says, as he reads over the article slowly. A pause. “I like the uh… adjectives.”

“Really? I-I love adjectives, too!” blurts Nitori, his face flushing red. Rin squints at him, then reaches over to feel his forehead with his wrist.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah! I’m really okay!” Nitori’s face just goes darker. “A-are _you_ okay?”

“Of course I am, I just—ugh, never mind.” Rin draws his hand back as quickly as he can. He’d just thought that he could be running a fever or something, what with how red his face was getting. Next time he’d mind his own business.

Nitori excuses himself to go and get some water, and leaves the room. A few seconds later, Rin hears him stop right outside the door, and he pokes his head back in to ask where the kitchen is. He points it out, but it seems to take Nitori much longer than necessary to come back with two glasses, silently setting one down in front of Rin and raising the other to his mouth.

“Are you sure you’re not sick?” Rin asks suspiciously.

Smiling serenely, Nitori shakes his head. “I’m just fine. Don’t worry about it.”

“I wasn’t,” Rin says.

“Okay.” Nitori puts his glass down a little too carefully, like he’s trying not to smash the table or something. Then he widens his smile a timid half-inch. “So, how are things going with you-know-who?”

“Not great,” Rin confesses, “he’s basically in love with that stupid whale.”

 “He is quite handsome,” concedes Nitori, thoughtfully, “for a whale.”

“Are you serious? He’s still a whale! And Haru just thinks—just thinks that he can—with a whale—and it—and I—”

He stops. Nitori is staring at him, completely bewildered. “I… Rin-senpai, I was just joking.”

“Oh,” says Rin. “Right. Obviously. Because it’s… it’s a whale.”

Haru had said that yesterday, too, come to think of it; how even when Makoto looked like a human, he was still a whale. If Haru still considers him an animal, then there’s no way he’s viewing him like that, right? Then again, Rin doesn’t even know why he’s become so convinced of it. Perhaps it’s just that even as a whale, Makoto seems to have this strange connection with Haru that goes beyond any relationship he’s seen between human and animal. If his relationship with Haru was a river—racing, tumbling, twisting unexpectedly on an ever-changing, exhilarating path—then Makoto’s relationship with him is the ocean; silent and still, then suddenly deadly.

“Rin-senpai, you’re looking kind of pale. Are _you_ feeling sick?” Nitori reaches over to feel _his_ forehead. “Is that why you’re not at work today?”

“N-no, idiot, I’m fine,” Rin splutters, brushing his hand off. “I just—I was just thinking about something.”

“Something about the whale?” Nitori sinks back down onto his cushion and frowns at him. “That whale always makes you strange. Is there something the matter with him?”

“It’s not like that. It’s just… Haru.” Rin squeezes his glass in both hands. “I just worry. And then I get pissed at him, and then he gets upset and won’t listen any more. And it’s just…”

“Confusing?” supplies Nitori, after he’s let it hang for a while.

“No, it’s just… it’s worse than that. It’s just… _nothing_. He doesn’t want to see me. He doesn’t want to talk. And we were just so—we were _so_ —” He feels the back of his throat tightening, like his grip on his glass. His vision starts to blur and he sees Nitori’s face through the haze, blinks it back again. “Sorry. Never mind.”

“No, no, it’s fine. You can tell me.” Nitori leans over closer, and covers his hands with his on the cup. “I’ll tell you things, too, and it won’t be embarrassing.”

“Bullshit,” Rin laughs, throat still tight. “I couldn’t even tell him this. Fuck, I used to think we’d be together forever. In highschool I’d have married him. Isn’t that stupid?”

“That’s not stupid,” says Nitori softly, “you love him.”

_Love_. Not _loved_. Rin doesn’t know what to think about that. It doesn’t feel the same way it did back then… but neither does anything else, and it’s close enough that he just doesn’t care. The trouble is that he wants to love someone who loves him back, and Haru… well, he’ll never know what he’s thinking. Self-conscious, he pulls his hands out from under Nitori’s.

“Maybe. But he’s not having any of it. Told me as much himself... whatever.” He forces a laugh and runs his hands shakily through his hair. “Whatever. Like it matters. You were going to tell me something embarrassing too, right?”

“Um—”

“Don’t back out. You promised. You gotta tell me an embarrassing story. You gonna tell me about how Doctor Dork broke your heart or something?” As soon as he says it, he feels guilty. Shit. What if he actually—

“He didn’t,” sighs Nitori. “It was me.”

“You—seriously?”

“I called it off.” Nitori averts his eyes. “I really hurt his feelings, too.”

Rin needs a few minutes to process this. He takes a few seconds. “…But you’re _nice_.”

“Not really. We went out for six months and I didn’t even…” He fidgets. “I _liked_ him. It’s not that. Everything was fine. We were nice to each other, and we went places together, I met his family… and I guess all along I figured... figured there’d be this moment, you know? Where I just looked at him and realised how much I…”

“Loved him,” Rin mumbles. He wasn’t equipped for this. Nitori looks sad now, and he doesn’t know what he’s going to do if he cries or something. Put a tissue on his face? He doesn’t even know if there are tissues in this room. Subtly, he starts searching the shelves in Haru’s living room with his eyes.

“Yeah. But I didn’t.” Nitori looks up at him again, and he’s smiling. “So I had to say something. He was talking about moving in together. Asking about things like kids—”

Rin raises his eyebrows. “Fuck, he moves fast.”

Nitori laughs. “That’s just how he is. Once he commits to something, he takes it so seriously. It’s why I worry about him, with Nagisa.”

“What about Nagisa?”

“Well, Nagisa likes him, doesn’t he?” This is news to Rin, but he nods. “I just know that Rei could easily fall for someone like that, but I don’t want him to end up with a person who won’t take him seriously.”

Rin wrinkles his nose. “It’s not your problem, though, is it?”

“Just like Haru isn’t yours?” That shuts him up. “S-sorry. I know it’s not, but I still care what happens. I mean, sometimes I even wonder what it would have been like if I’d just stayed with him. It wouldn’t have been _that_ bad, except… except…”

“Except you’d be married straight out of college with three kids or something?” Rin forces a little laugh. This sort of emotional depth is a little bit past him, but as if he’s going to admit that. He must be doing all right because Nitori laughs, too, even though his eyes look tired.

“I _liked_ that he wanted that, though. I liked lots of things about him.” His smile melts away. “I really did. I don’t know why I couldn’t love him.”

 “Well, you can’t just… I don’t know, _force_ that sort of thing.” Rin rubs the back of his head awkwardly. “Love’s, like, a big deal. I guess it’s good you didn’t lie about it or anything.”

“Does it count as lying if you let someone _think_ it’s true? Because I didn’t say it but I didn’t—”

 “No, no, that’s a white lie, it’s different.” Rin shakes his head. “It’s not as bad.”

“Really? Couldn’t it be even worse?  They’d just never know, and then once they found out they’d think about how day after day you just hid this _huge_ secret that could change _everything_ and—”

“Uh, look,” Rin cuts him off with his hands. “This is getting kind of, I dunno, kind of intense for like… us just hanging out drinking glasses of water and stuff. Let’s just… chill.”

“Oh. Then, um—” Nitori taps his chin with his index finger. “How about you tell me what else is happening at the aquarium again?”

_That’s just as bad,_ thinks Rin, but figures he can tell him some dumb story about Makoto learning the behaviour for splashing people in the grandstands and accidentally testing it on the cleaners. Just then, his phone rings.

Haru’s number is on the screen. And Haru _never_ uses his phone.

He stands up as he answers. “Hello?”

“It’s me.”

Blunt as usual. “I know it’s you. What’s up?”

Rin hears a pause, then a door closing on the other end of the phone. “Baby died.”

“The dolphin?”

“Yeah. And Aiko’s tests came back. She was really sick.” He hears Haru swallowing. “They might all be sick.”

What does he say to that? Rin hesitates. “Sorry. That sucks.”

“No, Rin—” He hears movement. Maybe he sat down? “Makoto. Makoto might be sick.”

Nitori is giving him a questioning look. He mouths an apology at him and goes out into the hallway to take the call. “Why would he be sick?”

“Because I _touched_ Aiko right after she died, and then I—” Haru’s voice cracks. “And then with the other dolphins… it could have been—”

“You didn’t know,” says Rin quickly, firmly. “Haru, you didn’t. It’s _nothing_ to do with you.”

“If he’s sick—”

“He won’t get sick.”

“He says he feels sick.”

“He says the Ocean has feelings and that you and I are in his magical whale-man pod! Take it with a grain of salt.” Rin sighs. He has to center himself. Can’t just yell, can’t just lose it. Has to keep calm. Rubbing his temples with his free hand, he takes a deep breath and tries again. “Ugh, sorry. Look, I’m sure he’s… he’ll be fine. Let’s just keep an eye on him.”

“I’ll do it.”

“No, _we’ll_ do it. I know more about whales than you anyway.” He sighs. “I’ll come in right now. Stay where you are.”

“Fine.”

They hang up at the same time. Nitori peers gingerly out of the living room. “Is everything okay?”

…Damn it. “Did you hear that?”

Nitori frowns. “Um… ‘whale-man pod’?”

“It’s… a band,” says Rin. Nitori doesn’t look convinced. “An… English band?”

Now he just looks disappointed. Even worse.

“O-okay, it’s not. It’s—complicated.” He groans. “ _Really_ complicated.”

“Do you wanna talk about it, Rin-senpai?”

“No. I’ve… I have to go help Haru right now, okay? So sorry, but you’d better go.” He hesitates. “It was nice to see you. Really.”

“I’ll drop you off, if you want,” says Nitori. “I go home past the aquarium anyway.”

He’s just standing there looking lost, with a bundle of his articles in his arms. Rin can see his own face peering from one of the pages. “I… sure. Why not?”

Nitori smiles. His chest feels funny. Great. Something else to worry about. “Let’s go, okay?”

They don’t talk much on the short drive down to the aquarium. Nitori’s car has papers all over the back seat, and stuffed animals squeezed into the gap between the window and the dashboard on the passenger’s side. There’s even one Rin recognises from his desk back in his second year of high school.

He wonders why some things don’t change and others do; why some people change and move on and others stay behind. He wonders why Nitori couldn’t fall in love and why he can’t fall out of it.  

 

* * *

The main gates to the whale and dolphin stadium are closed when he arrives, so he has to go around to one of the side entrances and use his key. Aside from the voices of the park guests and other animals echoing from outside the stadium, it’s very quiet here for once as he changes into his wetsuit and makes his way out into the pool complex.

Haru and Rei are with Makoto in the med pool again. This time he doesn’t seem to be making a fuss; he’s just lying there in the shallow water, his chin in Haru’s lap, while Rei examines his blowhole.

“Could you get him to exhale so I can take a sample?” he asks, once he has his equipment ready.

Haru blows on the whale’s nose. Makoto copies him loudly.

“Thanks, that’s fine.” Rei collects his sample and comes up onto the ledge, looking up at Rin as he does so. “Rin-san? I thought you were taking the day off.”

Haru looks up at him, too, just for a moment. Then he turns away again and keeps rubbing the whale’s nose. Rin lowers down onto the ledge beside him, looking over his shoulder at Rei. “Haru told me what happened. So what’s going on?”

“Well, we’re testing all of the animals in the stadium, but if they’re already infected it could be too late. Shows are cancelled and we’re going into quarantine.” Rei’s lip curls a little. “The Director’s not very happy. The only good news today is that Neptune’s new pool just finished being painted; it’ll be much easier to move the dolphins into the med pool now.”

“You like dolphins,” Haru mumbles to the whale, rubbing his nose. “And sea lions.”

Rin sighs and turns his attention back to Rei. “Thanks. Do you need to get back to your office? I’ll stay here, if you want.”

“That’s fine. Do you need anything?”

_Vodka,_ thinks Rin, suddenly. He says, “No.”

Makoto turns his head away from Haru to investigate him as well, putting his chin up on his lap and nosing his chest. Awkwardly, he reaches over and pats the top of his head. “Hey. How are you feeling? Okay?”

He nods his head and Makoto copies, as he’s been taught. Maybe it’s not helpful, but this small, stupid part of him thinks it might make Haru feel better. Right now he’s just sitting there, staring blankly ahead. It seems as if he’s not even thinking about anything, but Rin knows better. “Haru. Talk to me.”

Haru lets one of his hands trail in the water and Makoto goes back over to him, pushing his rostrum into his palm. He doesn’t say anything.

“Haru, I know you wouldn’t call me if you didn’t have anything to say.”

Turning his face away, Haru mumbles something towards the wall.

“What was that?”

He hears him taking a deep breath through his nose. “Let’s set Makoto free.”

Rin stares at him for a moment, blinking dumbly. “What?”

“He can’t live here. He hates it.”

Rin considers it. He really, truly does. “How would it be possible, though? Do you know how much money and manpower it took to get him here? You think Nagisa’s dad is just going to laugh and sort it all out for us?”

“No. But if he dies, he—he has to be in the ocean. He has to.”

“Haru, he’s not going to—”

“He _has_ to!”

These kinds of conversations with Haru are the worst. The ones where Rin can barely understand a thing he’s saying, but he just seems so _desperate_. It’s frustrating not being able to explain it all to him; that what he’s suggesting isn’t possible, that the park will never go for it, that there’s nothing they can do here all on their own… Haru’s not going to accept something like that now.

“Haru… they don’t just _release_ killer whales. It’s not even possible for most of them. And even if you were going to, you’d have to think about all sorts of things; where the rest of his pod is, whether he’s too used to humans, his health…” He stops to take a heavy breath and let it out slowly. “Haru, if he _was_ sick, it could be irresponsible to put him back in the ocean where he could infect other animals. You’ve got to think more seriously about…”

He realises just then that Haru isn’t listening to him. He’s just sitting there with his legs tucked up to his chest, hiding his face in his folded arms. He’s even ignoring Makoto, who is nudging his legs anxiously. Rin sighs.

“Damn it, Haru…” He reaches out to him, gingerly this time, and when Haru doesn’t pull away he hugs him. After a moment he feels Haru tucking his face against his neck and wrapping his own arms around him loosely. He feels so tired and fragile that Rin feels like he’ll break him if he holds any tighter.

“I promised I would get him home somehow,” he says shakily. “But I can’t do anything.”

Rin rubs his back and watches the whale over his shoulder. He centers himself and answers slowly. “I… look, this is fucking crazy, but… if it means that much, I’ll help you, all right? I know these animals and I know this business… there’s got to be something. In the meantime we’ll both watch over him.”

Haru doesn’t say anything, but he presses a little closer. Rin hesitates, then tilts his face quickly to kiss the top of his head.

“Like I’d just leave you to deal with this alone, you idiot.”

Haru straightens up slowly and looks right into his eyes for what feels like ages. Then he nods and turns back to Makoto again, stroking the sides of his head and lowering his legs into the water so his feet touch the fronts of his flippers. Rin knows that’s the most he can expect of Haru, especially right now. So he sits with him—with both of them—until Rei comes back to move Makoto out of the med pool. For the first time, it feels right.

 

* * *

When they get home, Haru shows him the list of aquariums where Makoto’s family have been sent. Two of the parks have names Rin recognises, the other two he’s not sure of, and the last seems to have been crossed out. Haru explains that it’s the park where Makoto’s uncle died, so there’s no point calling them.

Since Haru’s useless on the phone, Rin takes the initiative, with the same scripted conversation for each park. In the end he has a short blurb about each whale next to their respective parks; “Juvenile, male, was off food and lost weight, now fine”; “Adult, female, gave birth to calf a few weeks ago which sadly died”; “Adult, female, reliable show animal, subdominant”. Haru sits beside him and listens silently. Every now and then, he makes additions to Rin’s notes that seem to be based on his own limited knowledge of Makoto’s missing family.

When they’re finished, Rin puts down the phone and looks at him again. He’s been quiet all this time, but when Rin stands up to go he says, “Thank you.”

“It’s fine. I told you I’ll do what I can.”

Haru pauses. Fidgets uncomfortably in his seat. “I couldn’t do this without you.”

“I know,” says Rin, “you always sucked at talking on the phone. Remember when—”

“I couldn’t do any of this without you.”

It’s strange seeing Haru so vulnerable again. Usually, he bears the pressure until he absolutely can’t, so it’s strange for him to open up like this when he’s been deliberately keeping his distance all this time. Could things have started going back to normal this fast?

Rin wants things to be back to normal more than anything. He wants to be sixteen and happy and in love, no longer taking anything for granted. He won’t complain about living in a small town any more. He won’t bother Haru about not being ambitious enough. He’ll just love him and be loved and it will all be okay.

He doesn’t realise he’s crying until Haru asks what’s wrong.

“Nothing,” he insists pointlessly, rubbing his face with the back of his arm. “I just love you. I always loved you. I can’t help it—I tried to give up on you and I couldn’t—I’m such an idiot.”

Haru lowers his gaze. “You’re not an idiot.”

“I missed you every day,” Rin blurts, “I missed your stupid face and your stupid voice and—and your stupid everything. I even missed your stupid mackerel.”

There’s a much longer pause this time. He sees Haru’s lips twisting at the corners. Then he turns his face away and mumbles, “Me, too.”

Rin responds to this about as intelligently as could be expected.

“You’re so—so _dumb_ ,” he sobs, and kisses him. He’s so close and warm that he wants to cry even more as he holds his face in both hands and tastes his own tears on his lips.

But Haru doesn’t kiss him back. When Rin pulls away he’s just standing there looking as numb as he did earlier that day in the med pool. He kisses him again to make sure, but nothing happens.

“I’m sorry,” Haru says softly. “I can’t.”

Rin’s tears feel suddenly cold on his cheeks. “Why not?”

Haru’s feet shuffle slightly. He’s moving backwards; moving away from him. “I don’t know. I want to. I just can’t.”

“Yes, you can,” Rin splutters, even though in the back of his mind he’s already thought of how Nitori tried to love someone and couldn’t, no matter what he did. “You can. You could just be with me and it would be fine. _Everything_ would be fine.”

This time Haru takes longer to respond again. “I have to think about it.”

“You had _ten years_ to think about it!” Rin’s mouth is moving on its own now, whether he wants it to or not. When he looks at Haru, he sees that he’s struggling to get words out at all. “Why didn’t you think about it? I can hardly think about anything else some nights. You kept my things—you kept _our_ things—and you’re saying you don’t—”

“I do,” Haru insists. His voice sounds high and tight, like he’s barely squeezing the words out. “But I’m not… sure. I can’t… do that. Not to you.”

“I don’t care,” says Rin, taking his hands in his. “Please.”

Haru draws his hands away, shivering, and turns his back completely. “No.”

His hands fall uselessly at his sides. “What…?”

“No,” Haru repeats, and leaves. Rin can hear him crying on his way up the stairs. It’s that sound that brings his sense back in a dizzying rush; that sound that tells him he fucked up. Badly.

He makes a phone call. Then, when he can’t hear Haru any more, he steals upstairs as quietly as he can to retrieve his bag from the spare room.

 

* * *

Nitori doesn’t ask him anything until they get back to his house; a small two-storey place nestled on a hill near the beach. Before Rin can open the car door, he reaches over and timidly touches his shoulder. “So, what—”

“I fucked up,” Rin says simply. “I embarrassed myself and made Haru upset and I just… fucked up. A lot.”

“Oh,” says Nitori, “well, um, at least you called me. If there’s anything I can do, um…”

He falters, eyes in his lap. Rin doesn’t blame him. It’s not like there _is_ anything he can do that he isn’t doing already, after all; letting him stay at his house even if it is just for a few nights is a pretty big ask. “Don’t worry about it. Thanks. You didn’t have to.”

“It’s fine.” Nitori smiles sheepishly. “Um, can you wait in the car for a second? I don’t mind, but Keiko isn’t always comfortable with unexpected guests.”

_Keiko…_? Rin frowns. Is that Nitori’s girlfriend? No, he said he didn’t date. A roommate, maybe…? His house looks big enough, but he’d always gotten the impression he lived alone. Maybe—

From the car, he sees Nitori open the door and a large, white shape springing up to greet him. He comes back down to the fence with it in tow (Rin assumes “it” is supposed to be a dog and not an escaped polar bear). Nitori beckons to him and he opens the door, rolling his suitcase behind him and opening the gate slowly.

“Keiko, this is Rin,” he’s saying, kneeling next to the huge, fluffy animal with his arms around its neck. “He’s our guest, so be a nice girl, okay?”

The dog puts her ears back and examines him critically. Rin widens his stance a little unconsciously, in case it jumps on him or something. You know, not that he’s scared of dogs or anything. Because that would be totally stupid.

“Uh, hi Keiko.” Nitori motions for him to give him his hand so he extends it, palm up, and Keiko leans in to sniff it apprehensively. She must have decided he’s all right, though, because she licks it briefly before stepping back again. “What is she? She _is_ a she, right?”

“A Samoyed. She’s just turned four this April, and she likes the beach, and belly rubs, and—” He cuts himself off. “S-sorry. You probably don’t want to hear about it right now.”

He looks guilty for a second, but Keiko licks his face and he laughs again. Rin’s stomach clenches a little. Maybe he should just get a dog or a cat; something normal like that. They seem much less complicated than whales or, worse, _people_.

“No. It’s fine. I’m just… thanks for having me. You didn’t have to.”

“You’re welcome whenever you want. It’ll be like highschool again, right, Rin-senpai? Except I don’t have a bunk bed, sorry. My spare room is tidy, though, and you can use my kitchen and my TV and my—”

“Thanks,” says Rin quickly, “really. It’s fine.”

Nitori shows him inside, and Keiko follows him attentively into the spare room, waiting for him to put his things down before following him out again, tail high and wagging curiously. Eventually Nitori is good enough to distract her with a squeaky toy, which she rolls around on the floor with while he makes a cup of tea. Rin just sits there staring at her. He can’t imagine what it’s like to be that carefree.

“So,” says Nitori, as he sets the tea down and takes a seat next to Rin on the couch, “are you going to tell me what happened?”

Rin pauses. Some of what’s been going on would be easy enough—if a little embarrassing—to explain. Then there’s the _other_ stuff. The “magic killer whale transforming into a man every midnight” stuff.

“Uh…” He _does_ owe it to him if he’s going to be staying here, but the last thing he wants is Nitori thinking he’s lost his mind. The poor guy would probably phone in a doctor. “It’s a bit—”

“Complicated. You said.” Nitori takes a sip from his cup. “That’s fine, Rin-senpai, I hear a lot of weird stuff at work.”

“I don’t know,” says Rin, fidgeting. “This is kind of… _really_ weird.”

“You’ve got to tell me then. I need a new scoop.” He must have looked horrified, because Nitori backtracks immediately; “I was joking! B-but… I just want to help, so…”

“You can’t help.” Rin looks away from him as firmly as he can. “Not with this. And if I tell you, you’ll just—you’ll think I’m crazy and kick me out or—”

“No!” says Nitori, so abruptly that Keiko looks up from her toy. He softens again. “I—I wouldn’t. I promise. Please?”

Rin looks back at him, catches his eyes, and something in him gives way.

Fine. Fuck it. What does it matter, right? What does it matter if his legs are fucked and Haru doesn’t love him any more and there’s a killer whale rendition of Swan Lake going on in his goddamn workplace? What does it matter if Nitori thinks he’s nuts on top of all that? So, he tells him as much as he can, from start to finish, paying extra attention to the Makoto parts (and making sure to mention, often, that he _knows_ how ridiculous it sounds). Nitori keeps very quiet, watching him from the other end of the couch. Keiko, on the other hand, falls asleep less than halfway through.

When he’s finished, Nitori leans back on the couch and looks at him for a long time. Then he just says, “Okay.”

Rin blinks. “‘Okay’? That’s all you have to say to all that? ‘ _Okay_ ’?”

“Well, did you lie?”

“Of course not!”

“Then okay. I believe you.” Nitori goes to take a sip from his cup, realises it’s empty, and sets it down again awkwardly. “No wonder you’ve been feeling stressed out.”

“You’re just going to accept all that stuff about the whale—”

“Yes. I know you wouldn’t make something like that up. You couldn’t.” He smiles fondly, then lets his expression turn more serious. “So what are you going to do? About the whale, I mean. Is he going to be okay?”

Immediately, Rin thinks about Haru, who cares more about that whale than any trainer he’s ever seen. If _he_ feels a little guilty about Makoto’s human hands shaking in his, or the infection creeping slowly and silently through the facility, then Haru can only be devastated. He knows if he’s ever cared about Haru, he has to be with him on this, no matter how pointless or impossible it seems.

“Haru wants to set him free. But… we can’t. The park would never agree to it—they’d lose too much money—and it’s just… it’s not possible to transport him by ourselves.”

“What about when he’s human?”

“He’s only like that for an hour. Then he changes back. Ideally we have to get him back across the country to where he was first captured, and that’s not possible in that amount of time.” He shakes his head. “It’s fine, I don’t expect you to know what to do. It’s… we’ll figure something out. It’s fine.”

Nitori rests his head on one hand and stays quiet for much longer this time; so long that Rin actually starts to get a little worried, and leans forward to peer at his bowed face. Then he looks up at him, and smiles his timid smile. It’s so innocent that Rin can barely believe the next words out of his mouth:

“What about a bit of media pressure?”

A pause. “ _What_?”

“I thought… it’s risky, but perhaps I could take some interviews from you and Nanase-san—maybe even Rei, if he wants to and then, maybe, we could… i-is this a little much?”

Rin picks up his jaw, which seems to have been hanging. “N-no, go on.”

“Well… if you printed an article saying the park _wants_ to rehabilitate the whale, then release him, and one of you was on record talking about—I don’t know—his conditions, or his mental state or something… then the public would know, and the park would have to at least respond to it.” Nitori frowns. “If it was shocking enough, you might even get enough members of the public concerned enough to force some action… b-but it’s really risky. You’d definitely get in trouble and—and I don’t know, is it worth it? Would Nanase-san go for it?”

“He’d do anything for that whale,” Rin murmurs, burying his face in his hands. To tell the truth, he’d balked at first at the risk involved before he realised he really doesn’t have anything to lose. His career is over anyway. And, well, if Haru didn’t want to risk his job, then he’d offer to take the fall for him. It wouldn’t matter. Still… “I… I have to think about it. Geez, Nitori, you really don’t fuck around. I thought you said you don’t write that sort of stuff.”

“I-it’s just an idea! I’m not even sure if you should actually do it… I mean, I might get away with it because my boss likes me, but…” He looks up at him solemnly. “I’ll do it if you ask me.”

“Are… you serious?” Rin stares. “What if you lose your job?”

“I’ll get another job.”

“You can’t just—what the hell—I…” He shakes his head.  “You’d… seriously do that for me? Why?”

_Why would you bother?_ Rin can’t help thinking. _Just look at me._

Nitori’s face flushes again, and something suddenly starts to make sense. “It’s because—w-well, it’s because even though—even though I know you don’t—I know you can’t… Rin-senpai, I’m sorry, I don’t know how to say—it’s because I…”

He trails off and looks up at him with those big, pleading eyes and Rin thinks of the way he’d hugged him that first time in Rockhopper’s, how he’d squeezed him closer for just a moment and it… feels strange. Not the way he thought it would. But it’s been such a long time since someone loved him this way that he supposes he wouldn’t know.

“Oh.” He looks away, and now he feels his own face flushing. “Right. I… right.”

“Y-yeah. Sorry—I know it’s a bad time, and—and it’s fine, I really don’t expect anything. I don’t. I shouldn’t have even said it—but I wanted to say it, so you’d know, you know, or it’s a white lie and I—and I don’t want to—”

“It’s fine,” says Rin quickly. “I mean… you’re right, though. I dunno if I can… I mean, you know I still…”

They sigh at the same time. Then Nitori looks up at him again and pushes another of his placid smiles.

“I know,” he says, “I’m sorry. Is it okay?”

Rin reaches across the couch and ruffles his hair, letting himself smile again. “Yeah, we’re cool. And thanks. For everything.”

Nitori leans up into his hand, his smile shining a little truer. “Any time.”


	8. Haruka

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all! You have just two more chapters to go! This last stretch is gonna be craaaaazyyyyyy!
> 
> These past few weeks have been a bit hectic for me, and I had to steal whatever time I could to write! The exciting bit however is that during these past couple of weeks my partner has moved halfway across the world to live with me here in New Zealand; since this story is dedicated to her, I've felt much more motivated to write lately even if I haven't always had time.  
> All I can say about this chapter is that it's not perfect, but I hope you like it anyway as I wrote it (or, well, the last half of it) through one of the worst fevers of my life... at time of writing I am still ill and keeping a handy bucket next to my bed in case of... well, you get the message.
> 
> I can't give you a link this chapter, since our internet isn't working well here at the moment and I am conserving it in hopes of there being just enough to watch the season 2 finale. I'm sure you understand. That said, if you are looking for a pick-me-up before/after you get stuck into said finale, then this probably isn't it... sorry.
> 
> Also, as I promised on tumblr, I specially dedicate the scene featuring Makoto learning the true meaning of pants to [hubedihubbe](http://hubedihubbe.tumblr.com), who was kind enough to actually promote this story on her own blog! I am not worthy. u_u;

The quiet stillness of the aquarium is a comfort for Haru tonight.

He’d known Rin would leave eventually. There’s only so much he can take, especially when he’s constantly pushing him past breaking point, and in the end Haru just hopes it was for the best.

It is, after all. As much as he tries, he can’t love Rin the way he used to. Maybe it’s because he already made himself say goodbye all those years ago when he saw their futures spreading out in separate directions and cut the cord before it could snap from the pressure. Then again, they’ve ended up in the same place regardless, and instead of him clinging to the past—to normality, to security—it’s Rin hanging on with all his might.

It had still hurt to see him look so desperate, and he’d still felt like a monster when he’d pried his fingers from the edge and let him fall, but Haru tells himself he had to do it. It was the only way, wasn’t it?

In the end he knows that what he did was just as much about saving himself as it was about Rin. Accepting him would have meant confronting aspects of himself he’s safely locked away for a very long time now. What would it be like if he allowed another human being close to him again? What would it be like if he fell in love? It’s been such a long time that he isn’t sure, but none of it matters now anyway.

With Makoto, all of these problems stop being important. Haru has lingering feelings for someone he’s told himself for years he can never be with, and Makoto has been forcibly dragged from his home and confined to a place that may very well be killing him. In some sick way it almost makes Haru feel better; mostly, though, it just makes him too sad to think about himself. Especially on nights like this.

The white glow he’s come to associate with Makoto’s transformation is only just fading when he gets to the water’s edge, but Makoto himself isn’t on the slideout, which means he hasn’t beached himself in time. Perhaps it’s because he’s only just moved out of the showpool and into his own “habitat”; a little confusion is to be expected. When they’d first put him in there, he’d spent most of his time near the surface, nibbling on one of the fake rocks until it was covered in white scratches. It wasn’t any larger than the comparatively bare and simple show pool, but perhaps it will still take him a little while to get used to it. Perhaps Haru will need to set up a new alarm system. Right now, though, he has another job.

He strips off his jacket and dives in, resurfacing shortly with Makoto in his arms. Luckily it seems as if he can’t have been under for long, and he opens his eyes almost straight away, wrapping his arms around Haru’s neck and holding on tightly as he’s ferried to the slideout.

That is when Haru notices the vet standing by the gate between the show and med pools, staring directly at them. At first he hopes vainly that he’s gotten away with it—in the half-light, perhaps it won’t be as obvious that they’re down here.

But no. Glowing water, naked man, no whale… all of those things are cause for alarm, so all Haru can do is watch, resigned, from the slideout as the vet comes rushing down to them.

“What’s going on? Where’s Neptune? Who’s that? Is he okay? Are you—”

“I know you,” says Makoto, suddenly. He frowns. “You keep… touching my blowhole.”

A conversation stopper if ever there was one. When nobody says anything, Haru gets to his feet, taking Makoto by the arm (and ignoring Ryugazaki’s rush to covers his eyes with his clipboard), and just concentrates on getting him out of the cold water. He almost walks right off, before he feels Makoto stop and turn to look behind them.

He supposes he can’t just leave it like this. But he’s so tired of explaining, and he doesn’t know what to say. How can he—

Makoto slips gently from his grasp and takes a few timid steps back towards the vet, teeth chattering. “I’m sorry I s-s-startled you. Do you want to c-come with us? It’s a bit of a long story, but Haru and I can explain, ok-k-kay?”

Ryugazaki shakes his head. Then he nods. Then he shakes his head again. Makoto just stands there, waiting patiently, until he finds words. “I—I don’t—er, well, I suppose—I—er, okay, but…”

“Haru is taking me to get dry and put some c-clothes on,” Makoto explains. He looks over at Haru and smiles fondly. “H-he c-can come too, right, Haru?”

“Right,” says Haru, stunned. He hadn’t expected Makoto to be so proactive, let alone for it to actually _work_ … but, lo and behold, Makoto is rejoining him, leaning his shoulder against his, and Ryugazaki is following them at a slight distance. Soon they’re closing the door behind them into the trainer’s lounge, and Haru is once again patiently dressing Makoto so that Ryugazaki can uncover his eyes.

“Oh!” Makoto gasps, when his shorts are almost on. “I’ve just realised what these must be for. You don’t have a genital slit, so you have to protect yourselves, don’t you?”

Haru just pulls them the rest of the way up and nods. “Right.”

“Do you get scared? I mean, even these don’t quite…” He fidgets. “It just seems so _dangerous_.”

When Haru thinks about it, he’s not wrong. He starts to nod thoughtfully as he stands up again.

“Um, excuse me,” says Ryugazaki, still standing as close to the door as he possibly can, “can you please tell me what just happened?”

Luckily, with all that he’s just seen and heard, explaining the situation to him is a fairly painless process. Makoto even handles most of it himself, relieving Haru once again. At the end of it all, Rei sighs heavily, bowing his head and pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose.

“That’s… unbelievable. Totally unbelievable,” he says, once he looks back up at them. “I must be dreaming—I can’t believe I’m even considering this, but… but...”

Makoto flops his head onto Haru’s shoulder and leans against him heavily. “That’s fine. I still wonder if it’s real, sometimes.”

Haru thinks his voice sounds a little distant, now. Perhaps he’s just tired from telling his story all over again. He leans back against him slightly, and Makoto fidgets.

“Haru? I’m cold. Can I have the blanket?”

When he stands up to get it, though, Makoto’s hand grabs the hem of his shirt weakly.

“N-never mind.”

Ryugazaki’s gone quiet, but now he speaks up again.

“Well, actually,” he says, slowly, “if you are Neptune—I mean, if you are a whale, then… this is actually an excellent opportunity. The things we could learn about social behaviour, about foraging techniques—”

“Nobody would believe you if you told them how you found out,” Haru points out, bluntly, but Rei isn’t deterred.

“That doesn’t matter. I would still know. If it’s fact, I could prove it some other way.” He laughs loudly, suddenly. Haru feels Makoto jump a little bit before settling back down on his shoulder. “I—well, try not to take this the wrong way. I’m not purely interested from a scientist’s point of view. If this is real, it’s pretty incredible however you look at it. May I ask some questions, Makoto-san?”

Makoto lifts his head up. “I’ll try and answer.”

“You remember me, don’t you?”

“Yes, I do. You were one of the first humans I met. I—I didn’t like you.” He averts his eyes. “But Haru told me you were helping me, and to try and trust you. So… I did. And he was right. You are kind.”

Ryugazaki leans forward a little in his chair. “S-so—do you remember—I rode with you on the truck.”

“It was dark,” says Makoto, slowly, “and you were singing a song. I didn’t understand the words, then, obviously. But you were quite good… it sounded like…”

He starts to hum, head flopping back down onto Haru’s shoulder. Ryugazaki laughs again, softer this time. “Well. I suppose only Neptune would know something like that.”

Makoto yawns, pressing his face closer against Haru’s shoulder. For a moment, Haru is tempted to just let him doze off, but soon he shakes his shoulder gently. “Makoto. Can you stay awake? I can’t carry you back to the water if you go to sleep.”

“Sorry.” He yawns again, mouth opening wide. “I’m just tired. Can I see the Ocean again?”

This time, though, when he gets up to the lookout point, he shivers and turns away. Haru watches him quietly answering Rei’s questions, keeping his back to the water as often as he can.

Looking at him then, it all starts to feel unreal again. He wonders: what if he’d never come down to the pool that night and found him floating? What if he’d never known his story and come to care?

Something else occurs to him, then. What if he _does_ save him?

If Makoto goes back to the ocean, perhaps he’ll be able to find his family and start rebuilding his life, but Haru will never see him again. That realisation stings hard; it doesn’t give him second thoughts, but it is still sobering to realise that someone who has become such an integral part of his life will cease to be if he does the right thing.

There is no perfect way for things to turn out for everyone involved in this, Haru realises. There are no happy endings, no ever afters, and certainly no guarantee that _anyone_ will walk away able to resume a normal life. Him, Rin, Makoto and now Rei… the circle of people who the story has touched just keeps growing now, and he doesn’t know what will happen when things finally come to a head.

“Haru,” says Makoto, quietly, “are you okay?”

Rei has drifted away slightly, as if to give them space, and Haru just blinks as Makoto approaches him, bumping his forehead to his just lightly before pulling away. “I’m all right.”

“Are you? I thought you seemed quiet.”

“Just don’t have anything to say.”

Makoto laughs gently, leaning his nose against Haru’s temple and dragging it back behind his ear. Haru feels himself shiver a little bit to feel warm breath ghosting carelessly against his skin. “That’s fine, isn’t it? You don’t have to say anything. As long as I can understand.”

He puts his hands on Makoto’s shoulders to push him back, but in the end he just leaves them there. “Understand?”

“I won’t push you. But if I hear your Voice sounding sad, or tired, then I’ll just know to take extra care, right?” He bows his head onto Haru’s shoulder again. “I’m good at that. I’ll always protect my pod.”

Haru guides him back enough that they can look at each other properly. “Makoto, I told you I’d find them, and Ryugazaki actually—”

“I asked Rei to join our pod, too,” says Makoto quickly, cutting him off. He’s smiling in this weird, unreadable way. “He laughed, but then he said yes. That means there’s four of us, now. You and me and Rin and Rei. We still don’t have any females, but that’s okay. We can look after ourselves for now, don’t you think?”

Even Haru can see this for what it is: denial; escapism; a desperate scramble for normality. Only yesterday Makoto had been so excited for more news about his family, and now he’s trying to push away from the subject as if he can’t bear to hear another word. If they were alone, Haru would try to talk to him more about it, but while Rei is here…

“Yes, probably. I don’t think any of us knows how to hunt, though.”

“You don’t? Then where do you get all those fish and squid?”

“Someone else does it, and brings them to us.”

Makoto thinks about it for a moment. “So, your mother, or your sister, or someone else in your pod?”

Haru shakes his head. “No. They’re called fishermen and they just do it because we give them money.”

“That’s right, you told me about money. Oh…” Makoto frowns. “Humans are really weird.”

Haru sighs. “I agree.”

A gasp from the other end of the lookout makes them both turn their heads. Ryugazaki is staring down at his watch. “Oh, no! I was supposed to go home and it’s almost one in the morning—”

Without saying another word, Haru takes Makoto’s hand and starts leading him back down to the water as quickly as he can. He doesn’t realise there’s something weird going on until he looks over at him, still a short walk from the pool complex, and sees that his eyes have changed.

As they pass the dolphin pool, he seems to be drawn inexorably toward the water. “I want to—”

“No,” says Haru, yanking his arm before he can stop himself. Makoto looks a little stunned, but keeps following him clumsily. “Sorry—you can’t get in that pool, the dolphins—”

“Nn,” says Makoto, softly. At first Haru thinks he must have hurt him when he yanked his arm, but when he looks up at him he can see that he’s picking at his clothes. He tries to think about this sort of transformation logically—if there’s any such thing—and ascertains that, of all things, it might be his shorts causing the problem. If his legs were to fuse together into a tail…

Ryugazaki naturally catches up just as he gets Makoto to sit down in the shallow water on the slideout and starts yanking his clothes off. It probably doesn’t help that Makoto loses his human voice halfway through this process and starts squeaking at him loudly.

In the end Makoto gets back into the water unscathed, and Ryugazaki comes down onto the slideout in his shoes and socks to stare as the whale resurfaces, carrying a torn up T-shirt in his mouth and placing it bashfully at their feet.

“Well…” he begins, then just shakes his head and puts up his hands in surrender.

“Goodnight,” says Haru, picking up the destroyed shirt in one hand and petting Makoto’s head with the other. It had been a close call tonight; one they couldn’t afford again. Tomorrow, he wouldn’t make such a mistake.

On his way out he sees the vet waiting by the gates for him. The poor man probably has more questions than answers after all he’s just seen, but Haru doesn’t know if he can help him right now. All he feels capable of doing is going home to his empty house and falling into bed.

“You look really tired, Nanase-san. Are you all right? I can drop you home if you want.”

“That would be nice,” says Haru, too tired to argue.

“I’m sorry for dropping in on you. I stayed late to try and give Oona some medicine.” Oona is the fourth dolphin to fall obviously ill. She’s been in the medical pool all day with the water drained down enough that she’s never far from the surface. She was having trouble floating. And breathing.

Haru tries to believe that knowing what’s coming will make it hurt less. But he doesn’t. “It’s fine. Sorry for scaring you.”

Ryugazaki opens the car door for him, then moves over to the other side. “I-it’s okay. Although… it does make me feel a bit awkward. I’m not sure if this affects how I should take care of him, since surely the biological—”

From inside his jacket pocket, Haru’s phone buzzes. Ryugazaki politely falls quiet as he picks it up, sees Rin’s name on the screen, then reluctantly lifts it to his ear and answers.

“Hello?”

“Uh… hi.” Rin pauses. “Sorry, I know it’s late.”

“Mm.”

He seems to have known what he was going to say and then lost his nerve. He tries again: “I’m… at Nitori’s place. We were just talking.”

Haru sits down in the car. “Okay.”

“Look… he’s got an idea. The whole situation with Makoto—I-I don’t know, I’d have to explain to you in person, but–”

“You told him?” It doesn’t bother him that much, but he’s surprised Rin would admit something that sounds _that_ crazy to anyone. He’s always cared far too much what people think.

“Yeah,” says Rin, sounding indignant. “I just—it just came out, okay? That’s not the point. This idea—it might work. Can we talk tomorrow?”

Haru pauses, adjusting his grip on the phone. “You aren’t coming back tonight?”

Silence falls on the other end of the line. Then; “I thought… maybe it would be better. For now.”

“Okay.”

“Are you—” Rin sighs, and Haru can almost see him shaking his head. Just then, Ryugazaki sneezes. “Who’s that?”

“Ryugazaki. He’s giving me a ride home.”

“What’s he doing there so late?”

“He saw us.” Haru leans back in his seat and sighs through his nose as he hears Rin’s choked noise of surprise. Of course, he can tell Nitori, but Rei finding out by accident is just too much of a shock. “Makoto wants him to join the pod.”

“The _pod_ ,” groans Rin. “Honestly?”

“Yes. He likes him.” Suddenly, he can’t resist; “Nitori’s not in the pod.”

Rin huffs. “Well, Makoto invites everyone _else_ who visits him at night. Nitori just hasn’t visited him.”

Haru wonders if Rin can hear himself sometimes. He doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t know why he even brought it up.

“A-anyway,” Rin continues, “I’m going to bring Nitori into work with me tomorrow so we can talk. Rei can come, too, if he wants. Are you okay with this?”

“Mm.” Haru doesn’t ask what keeps creeping to the tip of his tongue. He can’t. Why would he tell Rin to come back when he was the one who pushed him away? It’s not fair to either of them to keep this confusing drama going. So he just says, “Is that all?”

Pause. “Yeah. I guess so.”

“Okay. See you tomorrow.”

“Later.”

 

* * *

 

Later comes a little sooner than Haru would like. He’s practically ambushed on his way out for lunch the next day by Rin, who takes him by the arm and walks him briskly to the trainer’s lounge in total silence. Makoto lifts his head out of the water to watch them pass, but there’s no time to stop and pay attention to him at their pace.

Haru thinks Nitori’s plan is a little bit sketchy. It relies on too many things they simply can’t be sure of, and it seems to be mostly comprised of risk with little chance of payoff. When he mentions this, Nitori timidly corrects him. “I think it will depend on the tone. If the article is quite upbeat, and treats it as something exciting, it will be hard to interpret it as an attack.”

“It _is_ an attack, though, isn’t it?” puts in Ryugazaki.

 _Rei,_ Haru thinks, _I should be calling him Rei._

(They are podmates now, after all.)

“S-sort of. But we don’t have to do it! It was just an idea, but if none of you are comfortable with it, then I—” Nitori looks at Rin. Rin takes a moment to notice, but backs him up quickly.

“No, I think it could work. It puts pressure on management, it could get us support from the public… if nothing else, it’d attract enough attention that they’d have to do something.” He shrugs.  “I don’t know what, but something. We can’t just leave it, right?”

Haru thinks about it. “We could lose our jobs.”

“Yeah,” says Rin heavily. “It’s fine. I’m on my way out anyway. Why do you think I’m here?”

That seems to shut everyone up. Finally, it’s Rei who breaks the silence. “What are you talking about?”

Rin just laughs, but his voice cracks at the top.

“My legs,” he says, patting one thigh. “They’re fucked. From working with the whales. I can’t keep doing such strenuous work with them, or I’ll probably never swim again. That’s why I’m here”—he looks right at Haru—“teaching you how to wreck yourself as well.”

Haru stares back at him. It feels as if a door has just been closed behind him before he even realised he’d walked through it, and suddenly everything he’s done in this job over the past few years comes back to haunt him. Thinking he was doing good by teaching terrified animals fresh from the ocean to eat dead fish out of his hands. Stuffing those same fish with medicine when the stress gave them ulcers or made them aggressive. There had been so many things he’d done thinking that he loved the animals—that he was doing what was best for them—but in the end he’d only soothed pain that wouldn’t have existed if they’d never come to the park. It didn’t always work, though. Not for Aiko. Not for Makoto.

Why had it taken a whale taking the shape of a human to finally show him this? Why hadn’t he seen it before? When he looks around the room, he sees the others engrossed in thought as well. Whatever path they walked before, they’ve ended up beside one another now. Should they forge ahead or—

“I don’t think I can do this,” says Rei, standing up. “I—it feels dishonest. Shouldn’t we just talk to Hazuki-san and—and I don’t know, just explain, or show him… maybe he’d just help us?”

“Before or after he laughed in our faces?” Rin shoots back. But Nitori, ignoring him, stands up and crosses the room to face Rei directly.

“Rei,” he says, quite quietly, “I don’t want you to do anything that makes you uncomfortable.”

The tips of Rei’s ears start going red, and Haru suddenly can’t help but feel as if he shouldn’t be watching this.

“I, uh. It’s not just that, it’s… ah…” Rei fiddles clumsily with his glasses. “What about you? You could get in trouble.”

“I don’t mind, if it’s the right thing to do,” says Nitori, smiling up at him, but Rei shakes his head.

“I-is that the only reason you’re suggesting this? I know you. You don’t cross anyone, you don’t break rules…” He trails off with his hand up like he wants to put his arm around him, and Nitori steps back to speak again just as the door opens.

“Oh, hi guys! What’s up?” Nagisa bursts in with an armful of (thankfully empty) penguin harnesses to put away. “You missed Rockhopper’s Hoppy Happy Hour! I haven’t been able to do it for a while, but today—”

He pauses, taking in the scene. Then he tilts his head.

“Hey, what’s going on?”

“Nothing,” says Rin, immediately. Haru nods. Rei gives Nitori a slightly helpless look, at which Nitori smiles; politely, but coldly.

“We were just talking,” he says.

“Cool, Ai-chan! What were you talking about?” Once again Nagisa’s smile burns a little too bright. Haru honestly doesn’t know what the point of this is. Not only does this sort of jealousy not even make sense to him—it’s not as if Nagisa is _with_ Rei, and even if he was, Nitori hasn’t done much more than, well, talk to him—but it seems inappropriately petty considering what else they’re dealing with. So, while the rest of the group apparently gears up to talk it out, he just leaves.

They can tell Nagisa the truth, or not. He doesn’t care. He just wants to see Makoto again.

He doesn’t have a spotter, but he doesn’t care about that, either. Too many late nights, too many restless dreams, have taken enough of a toll that it doesn’t matter to him. After all, Makoto probably understands him better than most of his colleagues; probably even better than Rin, in some ways.

The orca comes to the edge of the slideout and bobs down like he means to beach himself beside him, but Haru pushes off the edge with his hands and into the water instead. Makoto doesn’t play with him or try to move him around; in fact, he seems very lethargic today. In the end Haru holds onto his dorsal fin and just floats with him until Rin comes down and—against expectations—just watches him until he’s ready to get out.

He wishes he had been born in the Ocean, too. Then he wouldn’t have had to worry about any of this. Then he could have met Makoto on their own terms, and if they were friends it was because they were friends and not because he was his only means for survival.

Rin wouldn’t be there. He’d miss Rin—in fact, every time he pushes him away he misses him even more—but if he lived in the Ocean, then he would never have met Rin. You had to know someone to miss them, didn’t you? Maybe not, because now that Makoto is here he feels a completeness he never felt before, in spite of everything. Maybe it was meant to be like this: him and Rin and Makoto and Rei, maybe even Nitori or Nagisa, too. A team. A pod.

 

* * *

Nagisa and Rei are still in the trainer’s lounge as he leaves. He thinks he hears raised voices, and even a curse word or two, but it’s silent as soon as he opens the door. Neither of them says anything as he collects his things from his locker and leaves without a word.

Nitori is waiting for him when he gets home, pen and paper in hand, and Haru lets him get right into it. He tells him what he can about Makoto the whale, and says as little about Makoto the sort-of-human as possible; but at the end of the interview, Nitori bites his lip and tilts his head at him as he tucks away his pen behind his ear.

“Nanase-san, do you think—do you think it would be okay if I met him tonight?” Haru just stares. Nitori swallows. “Rin was saying he wanted to come in and I thought I would give him a ride since it’s late, and I thought maybe, if it was all right with you, then I’d love to—”

“Fine,” says Haru, closing his eyes. Makoto seems happier the more people he meets, though Haru isn’t sure if he feels the same way. It was less complicated back when it was only him and Makoto, even if he knows the weight of the secret would have cracked him eventually.

“Thank you! Rin-senpai said a lot about him, so I’m excited to see for myself.”

“You agreed without actually seeing it, though,” Haru points out. Nitori just laughs.

“It’s okay. Rin-senpai is a really bad liar, so it had to be true.”

“I know. He’s terrible.”

“Right, but… he seemed really worried, too. So I wanted to do what I could, even if I didn’t quite know what was going on.” His eyes drift half-closed with the dreamy haze of the heartsick, and Haru wonders exactly how long this has been going on. When he really thinks about it, he realises it must have been a long time; he even remembers seeing Nitori giving Rin wistful looks back when they were teenagers. Back then he was actually a little put out by it, but now it’s almost a relief. He’s got no idea how to love Rin, or anyone else for that matter, but maybe Nitori has had long enough to figure it out.

“That’s nice of you,” he mumbles.

“N-no, it’s just—well, like I said, I still want to see for myself.” Nitori bows his head and takes out his notes again, looking over them slowly. “But… maybe keeping him there wouldn’t be the right thing to do even if it wasn’t like this. Maybe the difference between him and the other whales in aquariums is just that he can tell you what’s wrong.”

“I thought about that,” admits Haru. After all, he’s wondered how many times the dolphins might have tried to seek his help without result every night since Aiko died.

“It’s pretty complicated, huh? Rin-senpai kept saying that, but I didn’t understand. I wanted—” He cuts himself off, but when Haru doesn’t interject, he timidly continues. “I wanted to show him he could trust me to help.”

“He’s bad at taking help, too,” Haru sighs. Nitori just watches him; he seems nervous—a little embarrassed, even—as if he feels he’s encroaching on some unspoken territory Haru had set aside… but Haru doesn’t want the pain or the responsibility of defending any such thing any longer. He hesitates, then slowly opens his mouth again. “Nitori… can you tell Rin something for me?”

Nitori’s face flushes and he nods quickly. “O-of course! But you could just tell him yourself, if he comes tonight…”

 _I can’t,_ thinks Haru, helplessly, shamefully. _As soon as I look at him, I just freeze._

He clears his throat. “I want him to know…”

 

* * *

He dreams about the Ocean.

He dreams of a thousand tall fins slicing through stormy waves, of water stirred by the thrashing of powerful tails.

And he dreams of voices.

 _Where is he? Where is he? Give him back! Give him back to us! Where is he? Where is he whereishewhereishe_ —

The waves crash themselves out onto a small, dark beach. Makoto is standing in the sand facing the raging water, until he turns to face him and hold out his hands.

_Haru, help me! I can’t swim. Haru, please—_

_Haru, don’t!_ Rin’s voice echoes from up on the dunes somewhere, but Haru can’t see him. He feels his feet moving on their own, toward Makoto and the furious sea. _Haru, stop! Haru, please, I’m begging you,_ please _—_

_Haru, help me—_

He wakes up, rolling over with a low groan to face the clock on the bedside table.

It’s five minutes past midnight.

He hurtles out of bed, seizing his keys, pulling on pants and a jacket over his sleeping clothes as he rushes out the door. As he reaches the bottom of the hill, he realises he forgot his shoes. It doesn’t matter. The aquarium isn’t too far—it’s only another mile or two—he keeps running, picturing Makoto face down in the water, limbs floating.

By the time he gets there he feels as if his chest is about to burst. When did he get so unfit? Or, rather, when did he get so _tired_? He pushes himself the last stretch to the pool, expecting the worst, but when he arrives, he simply sees Makoto sitting on the slideout, legs folded.

“Sorry,” he pants, and crumples down into the water beside him, fully clothed.

Makoto yelps and gathers him clumsily into his arms. “Haru, you—you’re bleeding! Your walks… your walking parts… a-ah, like hands, but not—”

“Feet,” says Haru, dizzily. Even the cold water isn’t enough to completely wake him up. Rin was right; he’s been wrecking himself. Tonight, at least, it wasn’t even necessary.

Makoto adjusts his grip and pulls him up closer. “Haru, what were you doing? Are you okay?”

“Yes.”

“You don’t look okay!”

“I am, though.” He lies back in Makoto’s arms enough to feel him shivering. “Are… you cold?”

“Y-yes,” Makoto says, shaking even harder, “but I’m worried about _you_.”

“Don’t,” says Haru, dragging himself to his feet again. They _are_ cut after all, but he only notices when he puts his weight back on them and the chlorine stings the cuts. Still, he staggers to the trainer’s lounge as best he can with Makoto in tow. This time, both of them change into the old clothes he’s left there for them, and it’s him sinking immediately onto the couch to stop his feet from stinging. Makoto covers him up with the blanket and crawls onto the couch beside him, looking unusual as ever in baggy shorts and a slightly-too-small T-shirt.

Haru thinks he’s going to start asking questions like everyone else, but instead he just lies down against him and stays quite still, head flopped lazily against Haru’s shoulder. After a moment, Haru finds himself shuffling around to make him more comfortable, and tells him all that he can remember from Rin’s phonecalls the day before.

“There’s one young male,” he says. “They said he’s small and he didn’t eat much at first, but now he’s okay. Could that be Ren?”

“That sounds like Ren. He’s always been nervous, so he was probably really scared...” Makoto adjusts his head on his shoulder. “But… but he’s okay, now? Are you sure?”

Haru isn’t sure, but he tries to sound as certain as possible as he continues on. Makoto sounds sad to hear about the calf who died a few days after birth (“poor Aunty, she must be devastated”) and cautiously optimistic to hear about the plucky female calf (“it must be Ran!”) who evidently learned to steal buckets of fish when they were left beside the pool in her first week.

When he’s told him all he can, his voice is tired and he feels his eyelids drooping again, but Makoto gently nudges him to keep his attention. “Haru? Thank you.”

“Don’t,” says Haru, “really. I still haven’t… actually done anything.”

“That’s not true. You’ve done lots of things for me. I learned so much from you, sometimes—sometimes I feel like I might even be a bit human as well. Isn’t that silly?” He laughs, but it fades. He’s watching his face carefully, like he’s waiting for something to change. Then he lowers his gaze and carries on; “I actually… really care for you.”

Haru blinks.

“You’re not like anyone else in my pod, or like anyone else in the whole Ocean. You’re just… Haru.” He smiles shakily, looking back up at him. “I’m glad it was you who found me that first night. I am. I was so lucky.”

Averting his eyes, Haru swallows. Lucky? He wouldn’t have been here in the first place if people like Haru hadn’t thought he would make them money. How can he think he’s lucky, when Haru has only ever been able to do anything to help him with a group of people holding his hand.

“Haru? You really promise to take me back, don’t you? So if I die—”

“You’re not going to die,” Haru says quickly.

Makoto smiles sadly. Then he reaches up and lays his hand on the side of his neck. Haru’s spine prickles. “But still, thank you for showing me so many things. And thank you for swimming with me. And for chocolate. And for… for everything. I really appreciate it.”

“It’s not… just me,” he murmurs. He doesn’t know what this is, let alone how to feel about it, but his face is heating up and he’s even starting to lie back under his weight, slowly, steadily.

“I know that, but…” Makoto looks away shyly. “But I only feel this way about you. What do you think that means, Haru?”

“I don’t know,” he says, distantly. Their faces keep getting closer, and he isn’t pulling away like he usually does. What’s wrong with him?

“Me, neither,” Makoto admits, softly laughing, just as their lips bump together gently. Haru just closes his eyes and lets him lean down into it, arms and legs shifting to give him space. It’s not like it is with Rin. It’s not like it is with _anything_. He doesn’t know right now if what he just did is good or bad, and he doesn’t have time to find out, since just then someone knocks on the door.

He sits up, stiffly. “Hello?”

“Yo, Haru, it’s me.”

“Nanase-san, I’m here, too!”

He’d nearly forgotten about Rin and Nitori; it’s their voices that wake him up, at last, before he can abandon himself to whatever strange dream this is.

Makoto had almost laid down against him, but now he sits up sheepishly, pressing his knees together. Haru tries not to look at him too much in case either of them does something stupid. “Okay, come in.”

Rin pulls up one of the spare chairs once he enters and sits down on it, across from them, but Nitori is holding a blue clear-file which he stands to present to them. “The reason we’re late is that I was finishing your article! Rin-senpai thought we should act as quickly as possible.”

He pauses, then startles, bows hurriedly, and holds out his hand for Makoto to shake. “A-and excuse me! I’m Nitori Aiichirou, and you’re Makoto, aren’t you? It’s nice to meet you properly.”

Makoto looks at his hand for a moment, then leans his head against it. Nitori takes it in stride, standing there calmly and even giving his hair a little ruffle as he pulls away. Haru feels a pinch of annoyance in his stomach—who does Nitori think he is, doing that to someone he hardly knows?—but he just lets it go. Makoto doesn’t seem to mind, and even nuzzles back.

“Nice to meet you, Nitori Aiichirou,” he says, sitting up straight again.

“Um, just Aiichirou is fine, if you like.” Nitori smiles, and holds up his clearfile again. This time, he’s looking at Haru, too. “Would you like to hear it?”

“Go on,” says Rin, “tell them.”

Nitori squares himself and reads clearly from the page:

_The Iwatobi Aquarium has been a thriving part of our community for many years. Home to penguins, seals, dolphins and other sea life, the local marine park made headlines last month when it adopted a male killer whale, Neptune, from a drive hunt in Wakayama Prefecture._

_Neptune’s stay in Iwatobi has delighted tourists and local families alike; but, according to training supervisor Matsuoka Rin and senior trainer Nanase Haruka, it may be coming to an end sooner than we thought._

_“Unfortunately,” says Matsuoka in an exclusive interview, “the park was not very well-prepared for the arrival of such a large animal. His environment has been unsatisfactory for quite some time.”_

_Sadly, Neptune’s mental and physical health has begun to deteriorate as a result of his living conditions. While the park’s veterinarian was unavailable for comment, Nanase confirms; “He is depressed, lethargic and has lost weight since arriving”. It is unknown at this time whether this can be linked to the recent rash of deaths among the park’s dolphins._

_In light of this, the Killer Whale team of Iwatobi Aquarium would like to announce their proposal to return Neptune to the ocean in which he was born. While firm arrangements are yet to be put in place, the whale’s caretakers are hopeful they will be able to release him close to his capture site in order to give him the best chance of reintegrating with his wild family._

_“I hope to use my many years of experience with killer whales to do the right thing for such a special animal,” states Matsuoka. An impassioned Nanase adds, “There’s nothing we won’t do for him.”_

_The love between this whale and his trainers is clear to anyone. If you’d like to learn more about Neptune and the other animals at the Iwatobi Aquarium, please contact them using the details below!_

He falls quiet, casting an anxious gaze around the room. Eventually, Haru nods. “It’s good.”

It still feels risky. He still doesn’t know if it’s their best option. But it’s more than he can come up with on his own—at least right now—and he’s willing to try a lot of things at this point. Makoto lays his head on his shoulder again.

“Look, Makoto,” says Rin, breaking the silence, “I’m not going to pretend to know what’s going on. But I’m not going to leave you like this, either. If you want to go home, we’re taking you home, no matter what.”

Makoto’s eyes flicker shut. “Thank you. I’m so lucky. So, so lucky…”

Haru tries to resist the urge to melt back into sleep, crushed between the couch and Makoto’s weight. But in the end, he barely hears the last end of the conversation with Rin and Nitori, and only manages to open his eyes again properly to walk Makoto back to the pool and help him back down into the water.

There are only a few more sounds he remembers after one o’ clock that morning. Makoto’s high, gentle whistle. The sound of Nitori’s car starting. Rin asking where his shoes are. The front door closing behind him.

His phone ringing the next morning, at some ungodly hour.

He picks it up slowly, eyes too blurry to make out the number on the screen. He rolls onto his back to answer. “Hello?”

“Nanase, it’s me.”

The tone is so different, he almost fails to make out the voice at first. “Director?”

“Yes. I’m sure you know what this is about.”

Haru looks over at his clock. It’s almost time for him to leave for work, but—

“Sorry, I’m running late this morning.”

“Don’t worry about that,” says the Director. “Nagisa has told me everything. You won’t be coming in at all today, thank you very much. I’ll contact you later.”

His eyes widen. He’s more than awake, now. “Wait, I—”

The Director hangs up.

Haru’s blood freezes. The phone rolls uselessly from his hand, the beep from the cut call still faintly audible from where it lands in the sheets.


	9. Rin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last actual chapter, and I'm sorry it took so long! I've been moving in with my partner and our new flat doesn't have the internet set up, so allow me to be brief in posting this with the little time I have!  
> The epilogue will clarify a few things that this chapter certainly won't and I am writing a little something else to release along with it to answer a few common questions I heard while writing this story--still, I hope you enjoy it, and with any luck we will see each other again soon!
> 
> I wasn't sure what to post as a wee companion for the last chapter, but since it's a little heavy, I thought I would post one of my favourite articles about wild killer whales near the coast of New Zealand, where I live! Whales around the world have different social structures and behaviour patterns, just like we do... and apparently, [New Zealand orca like to surf](http://www.adventure-journal.com/2010/11/new-zealands-killer-whales-ride-killer-waves/). :')

Rin’s phone rings not long after Nitori pokes his head in to tell him he’s leaving for work, and could he please make sure Keiko stays outside when he leaves. The conversation is short. When it’s over, he puts his phone down on the bedstand with a shaky hand, running his other hand up his face and through his hair.

So he’s jobless, at least for the moment. Well, probably forever, actually. If he doesn’t get his job at the Iwatobi Aquarium back, there’s no way his park in Tokyo will want him again. What’s he going to do with the rest of his life after that? Wait tables? Scan groceries? The only things he was good at—the only things he ever _wanted_ to do—have slipped through his fingers as easily as water, and now Haru, too…

 _I’ve already contacted Nanase,_ he’d said. That means Haru has had even longer than him to process the helplessness of the situation. Rin almost gets up and runs out the door right then, but as soon as he stands he notices how stiff his knees are this morning. He’d have to wait to warm up for a run—or even a walk—of that distance. It’s ridiculous. Back in highschool when he was training, he could have run from Nitori’s house to Haru’s and back _twice_ if he wanted, no problem. Right now, it’s a mission just half-limping around Nitori’s kitchen looking for the toaster. By the time he actually manages to make the toast, he hears the front door banging and Nitori rushes into the kitchen in a fluster, Keiko skittering behind him.

“They pulled the article!” he exclaims. “The park called them first, someone must’ve—”

“I know,” says Rin, slumping into the only chair at the kitchen table, tiredly forcing toast into his mouth. “Nagisa did it.”

Nitori goes very quiet. When Rin looks back at him he’s practically bristling; in fact, he doesn’t think he’s ever seen him look so furious.

“No,” he says, so low Rin barely recognises his voice at first, “it was _Rei_. Only the four of us knew about the article, and I know you and Haru didn’t tell—that means Rei told, and Nagisa took it to management. Oh…”

He bends his knees as if he’s just going to sink onto the floor, then straightens up and laughs.

“Can you believe it? We’re all in trouble for telling the truth. I’m going to be investigated at work.”

“Me, too,” says Rin, with a half-chewed piece of dry toast tucked into his cheek. “But I’m probably just fired.”

Nitori goes to sit down with him and almost lands on thin air. There’s a delay while he ducks into the living room and returns, dragging one of the lounge chairs behind him and setting it down at the table.

“Well,” he says, “we can’t give up now. What’s our counterattack?”

Rin swallows his toast too fast and almost chokes. “What are you talking about? There’s nothing we can do; we’re banned from the premises. All of us.”

Nitori hesitates, nodding slowly. Then he stands up. “But Rei isn’t. I’m going to call him.”

“What are you going to—”

“You call Nanase-san, okay?” says Nitori, already pulling out his phone and vanishing upstairs. Rin sits there with his half-eaten piece of toast, which Keiko is staring at intently. Did he put his phone in his pocket before he came downstairs? With how his legs feel right now, he hardly has the nerve to check in case he has to go back up again. Mercifully, when he pinches the fabric at his side he can feel the hard outline of the cellphone case pressing back against his fingers. Withdrawing it, he stares blankly down at the screen for a moment before dialling Haru’s number.

He doesn’t press “call”.

What if Haru doesn’t pick up? Rin knows Haru loves Makoto more deeply than any of them; after all, he was always like that. When Rin had met him he’d seemed like an icy boy who didn’t care about anything, but just a few years later he’d felt him melting easily in his arms and molding warmly to his own shape as if it were all he’d ever wanted. Haru _is_ cold, but he’s warm, too. He’s firm and gentle, stubborn and giving; so much more complex and compassionate than too many people give him credit for. Of course he’d end up being moved by a situation as strange as himself.

What will he do if Haru’s been so badly hurt by this he’s completely non-functional? He’s already seen the situation breaking him piece by piece… and if Haru can’t be Haru, then how can he be Rin?

 _Well,_ says a small, critical part of him, _you’ve been Rin for this long on your own._

He hears the faint thuds of Nitori’s footsteps as he paces upstairs, but can’t quite make out his half of the phone conversation. _He_ hasn’t given up, Rin realises. He was loved by someone who he didn’t love and loved someone who didn’t love him and his world did not collapse into dust around him. He’s pushing forward—maybe even harder than Rin is. He can’t let that happen, can he? He’s still supposed to be his senpai or something. He should be setting the example.

Clenching his jaw, he taps the “call” button and lifts the phone to his ear. The dialtone goes on for so long that he almost gives up and puts it down again, but finally it stops and he hears the shuffling of someone handling the phone on the other end.

“Hello? Haru? Hello?”

“Hello.”

Rin can’t read his tone. “I… you got the call, right?”

A long pause. “Yes.”

“Nitori’s article got pulled, but he and I are working on it right now, okay?” When Haru doesn’t say anything, he takes a breath and continues. “We’ve got this, don’t worry.”

“Okay.” Rin keeps searching for something in his voice—worry, pain, fear—but there’s only a quiet hollow beneath the fragile surface. It’s almost worse than him being hysterical. Rin scrambles for words. “It’s okay. It is.”

 _Great,_ he tells himself, sarcastically, _that’ll do the trick._

“Mm.” Haru sounds even more distant than before.

“I’ll—I’ll come see you later, all right? I’ll stay with you tonight if… if it’s okay.”

“You will?” Haru’s voice tilts into faint, tired surprise. Rin pounces on it.

“Y-yeah, I will. You want me to bring anything?”

“No,” says Haru quietly, “just you.”

A lump forms in Rin’s throat. “Uh. Okay. I’ll see you. Later. Like… five? No, three, I’m not… doing anything else. So… see you?”

“See you.”

He hangs up reluctantly, and gazes up from his phone to see Nitori standing in the door, head tilted. “Is Nanase-san doing okay?”

It’s not the word that Rin would use. But at least he knows that he can see him at three. At least he knows that he’s still alive and in his house and answering his phone and not off... throwing himself into the sea in search of the magical whale-man gods or something.

“Uh, I think so. How was Rei?”

Nitori’s lip twists a little. “I’m still not sure why he did it. He didn’t sound pleased with himself at all; he seemed really upset, actually.” He looks down at his phone, still resting in his hand, as if still imagining Rei’s voice on the other end. “He said… he didn’t want to give up on Makoto. He wants to meet us for lunch and talk about what to do next. Do you think Nanase-san would want to come with us?”

He shakes his head. If he asks Haru, he’ll force himself, and Rin doesn’t want to break him more than he’s already been broken. “Let’s go by ourselves. I’m going to stay at his place tonight, so I’ll catch him up then.”

Nitori’s smile strains for a second, then relaxes. “Then let’s do it. Rei will be waiting.”

 

* * *

 

They can’t go in, of course, but Rei has agreed to meet them outside the front gates, so naturally Nitori parks as close to the gate as he can. It’s terrible parking, too; he’s more than halfway outside the lines, but he doesn’t seem to notice or even care. As he opens the car door, Rin hears a long, low moan echoing from over the fence. In the same moment he’s relieved that Haru didn’t come with them; those are unmistakeably Makoto’s vocals, as agonised as he’s ever heard them. He didn’t realise things would deteriorate this quickly.

Rei pushes out the turnstiles, carrying a pile of papers and a wobbling bucket. Nitori gets out of the car as well, and Rin sees the vet go a little pale at the sight of him—strange, since he’d never considered Nitori a particularly imposing person.

Or, at least, he didn’t. The last few days are giving him reason to reconsider, and he even feels a little nervous on Rei’s behalf as Nitori strides around the hood of the car, crosses the footpath toward him and… wraps his arms around his neck, squeezes briefly, and draws away to arm’s length.

“It’s not your fault,” he says, “just tell us what happened.”

Rei squirms. “Nagisa-kun confronted me after the meeting. It was—I just…” He plucks at his tie uneasily with the hand holding the bucket, unhooking one finger from the handle. “Well, his father wanted to put him on the killer whale team part-time to help Haru, so he said if it was about Ne—Makoto, he had the right to know. I thought if I just explained—”

He sighs and gives Nitori a slightly helpless look. Nitori stares back, waiting for him to go on.

“Well, he said I should just talk to his father and it would be fine. Only—only he just laughed. Then—then Nagisa-kun told him about the article, and… he didn’t laugh.” He squirms again. “Aiichirou, I’m sorry, I didn’t—I tried to explain, but Hazuki-san called the paper straight away. It wasn’t that I—”

“Why,” says Rin, lowly. “I just want to know _why_.”

Nitori lifts his hands. “Rin-senpai, Rei is sorry, and—”

“No, _why_?!”

“Because—because Nagisa—I didn’t mean—I couldn’t—”

Rin thinks of Haru aching in an empty house and of Makoto crawling naked onto his slideout, limbs wobbling. He thinks of all they’ve done—everything they’ve gone through, up until now—and lets it bubble from his chest up into his voice.

“You’re telling me,” he snaps, “that you ruined _everything_ — _all_ of our jobs, Makoto’s _life_ —because fucking _Nagisa_ told you to?”

“It wasn’t just—”

“Rin-senpai, wait—”

Nitori places a hand on his shoulder but Rin pushes past him to stand chest to chest with Rei. “I’m _fucked_ , do you know that? My career is over after this. What about Nitori? Did you think about him before you opened your mouth? What about Makoto, what did you think—”

“I _did_ it for Makoto!” Rei shouts, the papers falling from his hands and his bucket clattering to the sidewalk, spilling fresh fish onto the concrete. Rin looks at his face—really looks at it—and sees that he’s crying. “The night I met him we talked for so long. He told me about his family—how much he loves them, how sad he is—b-but he’s confused. He loves Haru, too; and you, and… and he’s scared the Ocean won’t want him any more and I just—”

He breaks off, removing his glasses to wipe off the mist. “I want what’s best for Makoto. All three of you wanted to rush things _so much_. Even you, Ai—A-Aiichirou. You never… and _I never_ …”

“Sorry,” says Nitori, eyes on his feet. “Rei, I’m sorry.”

“I just wanted us to think about it a little more so we could help him properly—s-so nobody would have to suffer for hasty mistakes—”

“Well, we _are_ ,” hisses Rin, “so _thanks_.”

“No.” Nitori shakes his head.  “It’s my fault for coming up with the article. I’ll take responsibility, it’s fine—”

“No, _I_ was the one who—”

“Hey, Rei-chan?” Just as Rin had prepared for the two of them to get into an all-out apologising match, Nagisa presses through the turnstiles as well, still in his dripping wetsuit. “I heard yelling.”

He gazes between the three of them, then down at the spilled fish and scattered paper. Rei hastily bends to start tidying it up a little, bundling the papers back into his arms, while Nagisa focuses on Rin.

After considering many scathing, witty retorts, Rin rolls his eyes. “So I heard you ran to Daddy.”

“Well, I heard that you were going to do something stupid,” shoots back Nagisa, unflinchingly.

“Stupid? I was—”

“Rin, you guys were saying that you had to take Neptune back to the sea because he’s _magic_ and turns into a _person_ every night. Are you serious?” Nagisa’s usual smile is gone. “You’re lucky I didn’t call security just now. I _had_ to tell my dad. You were talking about doing—doing I don’t know what to Neptune, and ruining the whole park’s reputation! I had to say _something_.”

“ _Fuck_ your park’s reputation,” spits Rin, too flustered to conjure a proper response. Nagisa’s stance widens.

“Neptune _lives_ in the park! What do you think will happen to him if we go out of business?” He gestures behind him through the park gates. “To _all_ our animals? Our dolphins would all be packed up in the grocery store if we hadn’t saved them from the fisheries!”

“Well, they’re dying now anyway, aren’t they?” Rin shoots back. “Just like _Makoto_ will die if you don’t do something. He _can’t_ stay here. Your facility isn’t equipped, and even if it was, it’s—it’s—”

The words fade from the tip of his tongue. They still ring loudly in his head, but to speak them aloud suddenly seems a dark and terrible thing; a life sentence.

“It’s _wrong_ ,” Rei finishes for him, holding his papers in his shivering hands. “I know that much.”

Even Nagisa falls quiet at that. The vet crosses in front of him to stand next to the fallen bucket, trying to nudge a dead fish back into it with his foot. “Makoto’s not eating. I’ve been with him all morning and he’s not doing _anything_ —just floating there and making that horrible noise. We throw fish and he ignores it. We call him over and he doesn’t move at all. I can’t tell if he’s sick or just—just miserable. He needs to go home. Or he needs Haru. Maybe he needs both.”

 _He can’t have both,_ Rin can’t help but think, but he switches his gaze to Nagisa almost immediately to see his reaction. He isn’t nodding, but Rin can tell he’s thinking about it, biting hard on the inside of his lip.

“My dad… did say…” He swallows. “He said you and Haru-chan could still come back if you apologised. We could make it all go away—y-you could even stay here full-time if you wanted to, Rin-chan. He knows about your legs—your park told him everything—and he just… just wants you to do the right thing. For everyone.”

Rin almost considers it. Almost. “No way. If you won’t let Makoto go, then no way.”

“We can’t just—”

“See for yourself,” Nitori throws in suddenly. “Go and see him tonight. Take your father with you. There’s no way you can talk to him and not—not feel _something_.”

The mere sound of Nitori’s voice seems to make Nagisa puff up indignantly, and he rounds on him. “What do _you_ have to do with it? You don’t work here! You don’t know anything about animals, all you did was _fuck_ a vet student once and all of a sudden—”

“That’s _enough_ , Nagisa!” Rei turns Nagisa toward him with both hands on his shoulders, more incensed than Rin has ever seen him. “That has nothing to do with this—any of this! Y-you can feel how you want about me but you don’t… talk to him like that.”

“Right!” Nagisa turns shrill, and he shoves him away. “Because you just like him _so much_ no matter what, and you think I’m a—a brat and a _baby_ and you—”

“ _No_.” Rei half-laughs the word. He lets his voice soften again. “He’s my _friend_. You’re my friend. I—maybe I haven’t… had time to think about anything else, but…”

 _Are we really having this talk_ now _?_ wonders Rin. A quick glance at Nitori seems to confirm that, while smiling thinly, he’s having similar thoughts of his own. Rei opens his mouth to speak again just as another moan resonates from the stadium.

“Makoto is my friend,” he says, instead of whatever else he’d been planning.

 _Thank God,_ thinks Rin, and steps forward.

“Makoto is my friend, too.” He takes a breath and lets it go through his nose. “And I don’t care what happens as long as he’s okay.”

“Me, too,” adds Nitori, and looks over at Nagisa boldly. “What about you?”

Nagisa blinks at him then looks over at Rin and, finally, up at Rei by his side. Rin can see his chest, which had been rising and falling like a panicked bird’s, starting to slow. Then he sighs. “Well, I still don’t know if I can believe something like that without seeing it. But… I’ll go with Rei-chan tonight. I’ll… convince my dad to come too, if I can…”

“Thank you,” says Rei, bowing his head. The four of them sigh their relief that whatever this might be is over—at least for now—but their silence is broken quickly as the clocktower strikes two and sings out over the aquarium.

“Rei-chan, we have to go back. Shall we—”

“Yes, we have to go. I’m sorry, Rin-san. Aiichirou.” The two of them head back towards the turnstiles, but Rei adds over his shoulder; “We—we’ll call you tonight! Goodbye!”

“Goodbye,” says Nitori, though his cheerful politeness does seem a little forced. Rin wonders when he started to notice Nitori struggling to maintain his manners; in highschool, it had seemed almost as if he wasn’t _capable_ of being rude. This is truly a different Nitori, then, just as he is a different Rin and even Nagisa is a different Nagisa.

The only one who had stayed the same, in the end, was Haru.

 _Haru._  The whale’s vocals start to melt with the word in Rin’s mind. As they drive off, it’s almost if the sounds have become one and the same.

 

* * *

Nitori leaves him at the foot of the steps leading the way to Haru’s hilltop house. Once again Rin can’t help thinking that he should have said something to him; but it’s too late, and instead he begins scaling the concrete stairs, stoically ignoring the pain in his legs.

The door is locked when he arrives. He knocks a few times, then tries yelling and knocking harder, but there’s no response. So, reluctantly, he limps around the house until he finds a window ajar, reaching through to open it further, squeezing through it and finally tumbling ungracefully into Haru’s downstairs bathroom.

This would be fine, did the window not open over the bath. That, too, would ordinarily be fine, if the bath were not full and Haru did not happen to be _in_ it. Rin lands, fully-clothed, on his legs, spluttering and scrambling out of the cold water like a startled cat. Soaking, he finally stands up on the bath mat.

Haru, of course, doesn’t even look as surprised as he could, though his eyes do widen. “Rin?”

“Haru!” yells Rin immediately. There’s a second’s pause and he realises he doesn’t even know why he did that. Haru just said his name and he immediately felt that he had to compete or… something.

Rolling over so only his eyes peer over the edge of the bath, Haru stares at him. “You broke into my house.”

“Y-yeah, well, you didn’t answer the door.”

“I was having a bath.” Haru sinks back under the water.

“I can _see_ that!” Rin puts his hands on his hips. “Oi, don’t ignore me! I know you can hear me, Haru, don’t just—”

Suddenly, bubbles start erupting around Haru’s face. All of Rin’s lifesaving courses flash before his eyes and then out the window as he reaches into the bath and yanks Haru up by the shoulders.

But he’s just laughing. _Haru_ is laughing.

He stops after a few moments above the water, and finally shrugs off Rin’s hands and stands to get out of the bath. He’s been wearing his swimsuit the whole time, as usual, and plods calmly off to fetch his towel as if Rin isn’t even there. Once he has it, he looks back at him, unsmiling as ever. “Sorry. It just felt nice.”

Rin frowns. “Me falling on you?”

“No. You talking to me.” Haru looks away, towel flopped over his shoulders. “Like nothing had happened. I almost forgot.”

“But it did,” says Rin, quickly, “that was what I wanted to tell you. We saw Rei today and he’s still looking out for Makoto. Nagisa and the director are going to see him at midnight tonight and then they’ll _have_ to help us. They’ll have to see!”

“That’s good,” says Haru, still not looking at him. That eerie hollowness still echoes beneath his every word. Rin wishes he could fill it with something; anything. Only lately, everything he’s said to Haru has seemed to make things worse. For once, he doesn’t say anything, and follows him out of the bathroom into the hall. Haru turns to look at him over his shoulder. He stares for a moment, then turns away. “I’m going to make mackerel for dinner.”

“Ugh,” Rin groans, before he can stop himself. “Don’t you ever eat anything else?”

“I do,” says Haru, but that does seem to be the end of it. He pads off into the kitchen and closes the door behind him, leaving Rin in his wet clothes in the hallway. When he finally reemerges, it’s with a tray of food that he carries calmly into the living room to set down on the table, before finally taking note of Rin’s clothes.

“Oh. Sorry,” he says, and vanishes again, upstairs this time, returning with a towel, an old T-shirt and a pair of faded trackpants. Rin isn’t fussy. He just changes in the hallway while Haru sits down at the table, waiting in silence.

“Thanks,” says Rin, after they’ve both sat down and started to eat. “You didn’t have to have me over.”

Haru stares at him again silently, and takes another bite of fish. Rin goes back to shutting up and, oddly, it’s not half as awkward as he thought it would be. Without the pressure of conversation, Haru seems to relax, and eventually Rin finds it more interesting to simply watch him in his quiet calm. At least for now, it’s enough for both of them.

The spare room is as he left it when he goes up after dinner; unmade bed and all. As dark falls the two of them begin to watch the clock with increasing vigilance. Midnight finally drags itself in sluggishly, and the two of them sit in the living room waiting to see what it lays at their feet.

The hour comes and it goes, and neither of their phones ring. Then, at 1:15, Rei’s number finally flashes up on Haru’s phone (Rin’s, having fallen with its owner into the bathtub earlier, is still recuperating in a bowl of rice). Rin switches it to speaker to answer. “Hello?”

“Hello, is that you, Rin? It’s Rei. Are you with Haru?”

“What’s going on?” asks Haru, taking the phone. He lifts it to his ear, not seeming to care that he can hear perfectly well without doing so.

“Nagisa’s father just left. We’re at the pool, but—”

Haru grips the phone tighter. “What did he say?”

“He—well, it’s… I…”

Rin leans over to be closer to the mouthpiece. “Rei, what happened?”

“Well, I just… it’s…” Rei sighs, and a coldness creeps into the bottom of Rin’s stomach. “Nothing. Nothing happened.”

“What?! But it’s—Haru, you said he transforms every night—”

Haru drops the phone carelessly into his lap and stares him in the face. “He _does_. It’s been almost a month, and every night—the moon—”

He freezes. Rin frowns at him.

“What?” asks Rei, his voice slightly muffled with the phone’s speaker buried against Haru’s leg. “Oh—”

With growing realisation, Rin follows Haru’s gaze. It travels across the room and out the window, then miles above the Earth and into the night sky; the night sky, full of stars; the night sky, blue as ink; the night sky, where tonight there is no moon.

 

* * *

 

Haru doesn’t get out of bed the next morning. He’s not oversleeping; in fact, Rin doubts he slept at all.

He knocks. He calls him. He pokes his head in and asks if he wants breakfast. He considers telling him the house is on fire, but supposes it wouldn’t make much difference. He leaves him alone for now, and goes downstairs to check his phone. A missed call from Rei, 1:10am—he must have tried him before Haru—one from Nitori, 1:30am. Perhaps he was checking on things. Another from Nitori, 8:43. Another, 11:02. He wants to call him back and tell him… something. How can he, though, when all that’s happened is _nothing_?

Haru’s still just lying there when he goes back upstairs and peers at him through the open door.In the end, he comes in, and sits on the edge of his bed, which just seems to make him curl up tighter in rebellion.

Eventually, he lies down with him. Haru doesn’t pull him closer, but he doesn’t push him away, and Rin thinks it’s probably better than leaving him alone.

It’s the first time he’s been into Haru’s room since he went in on his own just after he arrived, and certainly the first time he’s been in Haru’s room _with_ Haru since they were teenagers, but gradually the heaviness in the air seems to dissipate. Slowly but surely, Haru sits up.

“Thank you,” he says, softly, and Rin, too, sits up again at the sound of his voice. “I meant it. Before. I couldn’t do this without you.”

“That’s why I’m here, though,” says Rin. “You don’t have to do it without me.”

Haru runs his hand up over his own face. “I don’t think I can do it anyway. It’s too…”

Rin sighs. “Complicated?”

“Complicated,” Haru repeats. Rin sees his head turn toward the desk, where the relics of their teenage years smile faintly from each surface. He follows his gaze; he can’t help it.

A long pause.

“Why… did you keep them?” Rin asks finally. Haru looks at him. “The stuffed toys… the pictures. I thought you would throw them away.”

“I thought about it,” admits Haru, “but it looked too empty.”

Rin thinks of his own apartment at home, all bare walls and surfaces, only the light touch of his family here and there where they’ve insisted he display things, and of course the shelf of old ribbons and trophies that only seem to laugh hauntingly down at him and his worn-down body. It _is_ empty, he realises; empty of warmth, of feeling. No wonder his family had kept bringing over picture frames and knick-knacks, trying to fill something that had no bottom.

Haru’s room isn’t so different, though, really. The photo of them in highschool has faded a little behind its frame, and the stuffed dolphins look slightly dusty. Keeping them there seems almost desperate and he wonders why he hadn’t seen that the first time he’d looked in here again. Perhaps it was because he had been desperate, too.

His eyes drift up to the sad-looking felt octopus, drooping down from the same shelf as the dolphins. “I was so pissed when I won that.”

“It was in one of those claw machines,” Haru puts in softly. “You started swearing at it while the claw was carrying it over to the dropbox.”

“I almost had another dolphin, but then that fucking thing got in the way! I—” Rin pauses, looking over at him. “You kept it anyway, though.”

Haru averts his eyes. “I did.”

“That was our last—”

“It was.”

Rin lets out his breath and tries to gather it up again, but his chest feels too tight. “I was so mad at you, Haru. I couldn’t believe it. I thought we’d just—just be…”

“Together,” Haru finishes for him, eyes downcast. “Forever.”

“I had it all planned out. What colleges we’d apply for, where we’d live. How it would be.” His hands grip his knees shakily. “And you know, after all that… the marine park was a fluke. I was just going to make some money after college while I figured out what to do. Suddenly they’re promoting me and I’m in the water with these incredible animals and I just got… carried away. It was too late when I realised… realised…”

Haru gives him a moment. When Rin can’t think of anything more to say, he fills the silence for him.

“I only got my job because Nagisa’s dad knew me. I wanted to swim, but I didn’t know what else. I didn’t… want to be with people. The animals understood me better, but now… I don’t understand anything. About you. About… him. About me.” He draws his knees up to his chest. “I said I would help, but I think I’ve killed him.”

“You didn’t kill anyone,” Rin insists.

“I didn’t help, though.” Haru folds his arms over his knees and lowers his face into them. “I’ve never…”

“That’s not true,” says Rin, and reaches through his arms to lift his chin in both hands. “And you know it. You did something amazing, bringing everyone together like that; it’s not for nothing, even now.”

Haru shrugs his head out of Rin’s hands. “If he dies, it is.”

“Then he won’t die! Nobody—nobody has to die.” Rin tries to reach for one of his hands, though his arm just ends up being on an awkward angle and pulling away again will only make it worse. “Whatever happens, you can keep going. I know you can. I’m going to make sure, all right, Haru?”

No response.

“Haru?”

“It’s fine, Rin,” Haru mumbles, burying his face in his arms again. “I’m going back to sleep now.”

He lies back down on his side, face turned away. Rin slides off the bed and takes one last glance around the room, eyes lingering on the sea creatures adorning the top shelf of Haru’s desk. He thinks of the happy boy who’d won them years ago at festivals and arcades, beaming proudly as he pushed them into Haru’s arms. It all seems so asinine now. Isn’t it all? No matter how much he does for Haru, how hard he tries, it doesn’t help. He’s just going to lie here, moping, until someone or something drags him to his feet again. This time, though, it won’t be him. He won’t just leave—of course he won’t, he’s still far too weak to do that—but he can’t keep carrying Haru as well as trying to stay upright himself.

“Fine,” he says, taking the sulky octopus down from the shelf and tossing it at him, “see if I care.”

There’s no way of knowing how much he will regret it later. Fate is stalking them even now, as he storms downstairs full of cold, tired frustration. Rin isn’t thinking of how it will all end as he falls asleep in the living room, unsure of when his racing thoughts slowed and became dreams. Later, he’ll be shocked he was able to fall asleep at all.

 

* * *

He wakes up to the sound of the door slamming open.

“Go away, mum,” he groans, still half-asleep. Someone is blurring into view just in front of him. They’re getting way too damn close, too. “I said—”

“Rin, it’s me! Get up.” A pair of hands begin to shake him firmly into consciousness.

“What are you—get out of my roo—oh.”

…Wait. Rei is definitely not his mum.

Now slightly more awake, Rin can see he’s back in Haru’s living room, and that Rei is leaning over him, soaking wet and still dressed in his work clothes. “What are you doing here?”

“Where’s Nanase-san?”

“Haru’s not—”

“Get him, now. Makoto is here. He’s in the car with Nagisa.”

“A whale’s in the—”

Rei shakes his head. “No, _he’s in the car with Nagisa_. We need you and Nanase-san to come with us, right now.”

Somehow, Rin doesn’t question it, and the resulting adrenaline is so successful in waking him that he practically bolts upstairs and into Haru’s room, startling him awake when he seizes his arm.

“Wha—”

“Makoto,” he says. It’s all he can think to say, and it’s all the explanation Haru seems to need.

Still in the clothes they fell asleep in, they dash out of the house on Rei’s heels and down the staircase leading to the street, where the car awaits, still running, with Nagisa peering out the window from the front passenger’s seat and another, very still, figure visible behind him. He gets out when he sees them coming, but Haru splits past him and into the car, getting onto all fours on the back seat beside Makoto. Rin can’t make out what he’s saying to him, if anything, but he doesn’t have time, since soon Rei is physically pushing him by the shoulders to hurry him down the remainder of the steps.

“Watch it,” he hisses.

“Twelve twenty-seven. We’re on a time frame,” replies the vet simply. Nagisa takes front, and Rin slides into the back with Haru and Makoto.

It’s the stillest he’s ever seen him; he looks very pale, and his eyes can’t seem to fully open. He sees him lean into Haru and Haru leans back, taking both his hands in his. They don’t say much to each other. Their eyes meet and Makoto just whispers, “Haru” and that seems to be all that’s necessary. Haru buries his head in Makoto’s shoulder and the strange man sighs and leans his nose and mouth into his hair.

“Aww,” Nagisa coos, leaning over the back. “You sure missed Haru-chan, huh?”

Makoto doesn’t seem to hear him, but Rin can’t simply go along with this. “You’ve sure changed your tune. What went down tonight?”

“Well, nothing happened when we went last night, but Rei-chan wouldn’t give up. So tonight, when the moon came back out, we became renegades! We’ve kidnapped Mako-chan and we’re taking him back home.” Even Nagisa seems a little bit exhausted by his explanation. “We need to drive down the coast a little to get past the marina, but we’ve got to be careful. If we don’t get him there by one, this car is going to have problems, and if something goes wrong when he’s back in the ocean we won’t have time to take him back. This is an all-or-nothing gamble!”

“Yeah, but you didn’t want anything to do with it just yesterday. What happened?”

“Well, Rei-chan was _quite_ forceful. The details are—”

“Nagisa-kun, don’t make things up.” He can’t see him very well in this light, but Rin is pretty sure he’s blushing. “I simply used reason and appealed to his compassion. Then when he saw Makoto for himself, he understood immediately.”

“I’m going to take full responsibility,” says Nagisa, proudly. “If my dad fires us all, then we’ll start our _own_ park.”

“He can’t fire me,” says Rei, “I’ve already decided to quit.”

Nagisa gasps. “What?! Rei-chan, you didn’t say—”

“Be quiet, please, Nagisa-kun. I’m driving.”

“But _Rei-chan_ —”

This is all far too much for Rin to be dealing with at this hour. He sinks back into his seat and lets them bicker, slowly becoming more aware of Haru and Makoto beside him. Somehow, their leaning and handholding seems far, far more intimate than it should, and a sense of dread fills him the more intertwined they seem. In just a few minutes, the two of them will have to be separated—perhaps forever—and the more connected they are, the worse it will be for everyone.

 _Stop it,_ he wills them both, _it’s for your own good._

He can’t convince himself that’s true, of course. After all, it was jealousy that had led to him discovering Makoto’s existence in the first place, and it is jealousy now that skulks and whines at his heels like an unwanted pet, kicked away too many times before. Perhaps in an hour or two it won’t matter, but he can’t be sure of that. Right now, he doesn’t think any of them should be too sure of anything.

The car pulls up on a familiar stretch of road and as Rin gets out the sound of a dog barking reminds him just where. Nitori is running down the gentle slope to meet them at the gate, where Keiko is already clawing and scrabbling. He throws his arms around Rin’s neck before he knows what’s happening. “Rin-senpai! You’re here, and he’s here, and they’re here, and you’re—”

“Twelve thirty-nine!” shouts Rei. It sounds like utter nonsense until Nitori’s arms slide from around Rin’s neck and he remembers himself. Nagisa is already rushing down onto the beach, and Rei is hurrying Haru and Makoto from the car behind him.

Rin suddenly feels himself unable to move. He feels as if the next few moments will change everything; his life, or perhaps even the world as he knows it.

Nitori pulls on his arm. “We have to go.”

“Okay,” he hears himself saying. They spill down the dunes with the others, Keiko bounding around them ghostly white, and find themselves before the flat, calm sea.

The moon is only a thin sliver of white in the dark sky but tonight it seems brighter than any of them can remember seeing it. There is an unsteady silence, until Keiko suddenly pins her ears back and rushes the waterline, barking madly. When it ebbs back in towards her she darts back again, crouched to face the ocean with her tail low.

Nitori laughs uneasily and the dog whines, looking up at him with wide, worried eyes. He kneels down beside her in the sand. “U-um, she does this all the time, really. Silly girl, Keiko!”

“No!” Makoto gasps suddenly. He shields his face with his hands and turns away from the water, trembling. Haru is tugging him by the hand, but he’s not moving. He seems paralysed, staring into his shaking palms, his bare feet placed squarely apart in the sand.

“I can’t do it,” Rin hears him whimper, “I can’t swim.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Haru says adamantly. “You’ll be you again soon. You can swim. You can go home.”

“What if I can’t?” cries Makoto suddenly, yanking Haru towards him by his own grip. “What if this keeps happening to me every night? I’ll die, out in deep water—the Ocean eats weak animals, and I’m—”

“You have to! We came all this way! We did all of this for you!” To raise his voice seems like such an immense effort for Haru, and soon he’s no longer able. “Just do it.”

“Makoto,” says Rei, almost timidly, “we won’t just leave you. We’ll come back and check on you tomorrow night, and if nothing’s changed… w-well, we can take you back, and find some other way.”

But like Haru’s, Makoto’s fight seems to have come and gone with a single outburst. He presses closer to Haru’s side again, and Rin can see his hands shaking where he grips his arm. Then again, it might not be just fear. One of his legs wobbles, too, and he caves against Haru’s side slightly. Rin strides over and takes his other arm, draping it over his shoulders. “We can work this out later. But you’re going to transform soon, aren’t you? If you’re not in deep enough water, you’ll be beached.”

“Oh,” says Makoto. His limbs seem limp and his head is drooping slightly; Rin knows now that he’s much, much more sick than he ever let on to any of them. Why else would he stop eating? Why else would he tell Haru he needed to be in the Ocean when he died?

The question isn’t if that’s what’s wrong, or when did it start, or why did it happen. It’s too late for any of those things. Right now Rin knows they need to get him in the water, for more reasons than one, and it’s not going to happen like this. Haru knows it, too; Rin needs only to look at him to prompt him to take Makoto’s other arm and start moving forward.

“I’m scared,” Makoto mumbles, when his toes touch the water.

“Don’t be scared,” Rin tells him, as confidently as he can. “You’re going home.”

And, privately; _This will all be over. Everything can go back to normal—somehow._

“I’m here,” Haru adds, as the water closes over their knees.

“Thank you.” Makoto shudders. “It’s cold.”

“Will be easier once you have a few inches of blubber on you again, then,” says Rin. Fuck. How could he have foreseen speaking that sentence one or two years ago? How can he possibly think, even in his darkest thoughts, that _anything_ will go back to normal after this? That’s assuming it even ends tonight.

The water is well up to their chests now, but Makoto’s feet are starting to drag in the sand instead of moving one in front of the other. His eyes keep drifting closed, and as the hour trickles away ever faster, Rin has the awful feeling that they may stop opening altogether.

Haru doesn’t seem to notice, strangely enough. He’s so focussed on moving into deeper water that soon Rin allows him to take most of Makoto’s weight on his own, following at a close distance to help them both stay afloat. When they are well clear of the sandy bottom of the bay, Makoto starts to slide from Haru’s grip. He readjusts it, keeping his face clear of the water.

“It’s almost time, Makoto. Are you ready? I’ll be here with you.”

Makoto says nothing.

“You did it. You swam out here, with me and Rin, even though you didn’t think you could.”

“You’re going home. Rin and I will find Ran and Ren, like I promised. We’ll bring them back, too.” Haru’s voice quivers. “I promised I would help you. I did. I helped you.”

“Haru…” Rin reaches out slowly. “I think—”

“Don’t! He’s fine. He’ll change back soon—he’s _fine_! Makoto…”

Rin looks over his shoulder at the shore. It’s too far to take Makoto back for human first aid, especially as this close to the mark that would also mean re-floating a beached killer whale right after. Whatever happens to Makoto now is in the lap of whatever strange forces sent him here, and Rin does not pretend to know the outcome.

Still, Makoto’s eyes are closed, just as Rin had thought, and if he’s breathing he can’t see it. He’s seen a lot of things in the past ten years—in the last month, especially—but Rin has never seen someone die. He doesn’t know why, but he always assumed it would be dramatic. Instead, Makoto seems to be simply slipping away, quiet and slow, without either of them noticing.

“Makoto, don’t.” Haru’s crying, now, and he knows. He didn’t even cry like this when Aiko died. “Please. I brought you back.”

Rin feels a lump rising in his own throat, but he makes himself talk through it. “Haru, we can’t stay out here.”

Haru ignores him. He wraps his arms around Makoto’s neck and presses his lips to his forehead. “I’m sorry. I did this to you.”

The moon dims behind a cloud. A wave ripples past Rin’s shoulder, as if pushing him back toward the shore. “Haru, we have to—”

“I love you. I’m so sorry.” Haru doesn’t even seem to see him any more. It’s only now that Rin truly starts to panic. Losing Makoto would be terrible, sure, but he can live without Makoto. Makoto isn’t Haru. Makoto is a whale—a strange, strange whale who came to them for reasons that Rin doesn’t even care to know any more—and Haru is—

Haru is gasping as Makoto’s eyes open. Rin sees them looking at one another, and for a moment, he feels relief. Only then Makoto leans in, murmuring something that he can’t hear over even the whispering waves.

Rin has exactly one second to know something is horribly wrong; something even more horrible than Makoto being dead or Haru being dead or both. Then he’s pulled under the water by an abrupt, powerful current, limbs useless against the suction.

How did it happen? The sea had been so calm that night. Bright, white light washes in front of his eyelids. He opens them, eyes squinting against the stinging salt. All he can see is the light and bubbles rushing from his own mouth.

At the center of the light are two men. Then a man and a whale. They move towards each other; the man holds out his hand and the whale bows his head, slowly, reverently. He somehow knows that if he could get between them for only an instant, all of this would be over, but as he swims forward his knee betrays him and he’s forced to use his arms as best he can.

He knows that Makoto and Haru will destroy each other even if they don’t want to. There is no world in which a creature from the land and a creature from the sea can be happy together; they’d only be forever compromising, forever meeting in shallow halfway points where neither of them can truly thrive.

He knows they would do that for each other—knows that, seeing them now in this blurry underwater dream—and he knows he can’t let them. Can’t let Haru go. Can’t let Makoto take him.

 _Haru, don’t!_ He tries to call to him. _Haru, stop! Haru, please, I’m begging you,_ please _—_

Perhaps he was almost touching them when the current sucked him away again. Perhaps he imagined it all. When Nitori and Nagisa get him out of the water he’s unconscious, and by the time Rei resuscitates him and he jerks upright again it’s all he can do to roll onto his side and half-crawl back towards the water. A pair of arms wraps around him from behind and pull him back.

“Rin-senpai, we’re so sorry,” Nitori sobs. “We tried—I promise—”

Rin looks up, knowing and dreading. The moon peers over the bay once more then shrinks behind the clouds again.

The sea is still as glass. Makoto and Haru are gone.


	10. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I had initially planned to save this until I had finished the little "extras" I had planned to release along with this, but you guys have waited long enough. I promise to edit this description with links when said extras are finished!
> 
> I know some of you might have been waiting for a bit more of an explanation in this last chapter, but I had sort of hoped to leave things ambiguous in the "canon" of the story; however, if you talk to me on [tumblr](http://sortita.tumblr.com/ask) I might be willing to explain myself a bit more (also, give you a summary of my crack ending where everyone just bangs and nothing matters). But it feels like a bit of a shame to ruin the "magic" here, so I hope that this is good enough for now.
> 
> It's been really great telling this story to you and I hope you've all enjoyed it. It has been great to read your comments whenever they pop up on my email and hear your thoughtful responses; I've been very lucky to have some of you stay with me all the way from beginning to end. ;-; This story was and is really special to me, and I was so touched to hear it was special to some of you as well.
> 
> Thank you for everything.

He remembers it so sparingly now, as if he had blinked and missed the moment in which Makoto and Haruka had submerged, never to be seen again. There’s an investigation, of course—the coast guard swarms up and around the cove for weeks, and the police turns Haruka’s house upside down—but no body, or any trace of _anything_ , is ever found. (Morbidly, Aiichirou almost wishes it would be. At least then Rin might be able to have _some_ sort of closure.)

The whale is an entirely different story. After all, a four-tonne animal is not so simple to misplace. Director Hazuki almost loses his mind trying to figure out how it happened. The police scan the park, too, and even the local fisherman become involved, but it’s no use. Nothing they find can possibly explain what happened that night and the three of them—Rei, Aiichirou and Nagisa—make up their minds that telling the truth won’t do anyone any favours.

Rin doesn’t weigh in. He doesn’t do anything. He stays with Aiichirou for a day, then a week. A week becomes a month and a month becomes two. Aiichirou doesn’t mind. He likes having Rin there, even if initially all he seems to do is stare silently out the window at the bay. Obviously Rin being sad makes him sad, too, and soon it’s too much to bear.

The doctor helps, once he persuades him to go. Rin takes mood stabilisers for a while on top of all the junk he has for his legs. Aiichirou knows all of this falls a little outside his expertise, so he just concentrates on keeping Rin’s environment quiet and comfortable. The rest of the world keeps turning outside his tiny house right next to that seemingly innocent stretch of ocean.

Director Hazuki gives up. He closes the aquarium and signs it over to Nagisa, who wouldn’t have been Aiichirou’s first choice. Yet, within the hour, Nagisa calls him and offers him a job. If the paper doesn’t take him back, he says, then he can do PR for the park. Or he can help with park records. Or be a sexy secretary that the CEO has affairs with.

(He’s pretty sure that last one is a joke. Hopefully, anyway.)

The park, says Nagisa, is going to become more like a hospital. They’ll take care of the existing animals for the remainder of their lives, but after that they’ll focus solely on rescues. They’ll release any animals that make a full recovery. The others can stay as long as necessary.

No more whales, Nagisa emphasises, and no more dolphins. They leave it at that.

He accepts, in the end. He wants to finish the work that Rin and Haruka started, and somehow he feels that this is the best place to do it. So he pours the best of his ability into the park’s new advertising, its press releases, its website; he tells whoever will listen that the Iwatobi Aquarium is doing the Right Thing. He doesn’t spend any time talking about the wrong things. He doesn’t know how. After all, Makoto was hardly a textbook case on which to base all of his opinions, and he doesn’t know any other killer whales who can tell their stories quite like he could. Rei does mention efforts to contact the other parks holding whales from Makoto’s capture, but nothing has ever come of it.

Rin turns down Nagisa’s job offer. Aiichirou understands; grooming oil off fur seals and feeding pills to gimpy penguins must seem like a bit of a step down from death-defying stunts with one of the ocean’s greatest predators. In the end, it’s Rei who convinces him to come back to help with the dolphins, reasoning that the program is on its way out, anyway, and that most of the other trainers have already moved on. The glamour is gone from it all, Aiichirou supposes, now that there will be more glitzy shows or magical swims with hand in fin. Even most of Nagisa’s sisters have handed in their notices, leaving only quiet Nanami steadfastly running Rockhopper’s.

The next day, when Aiichirou heads off for work, Rin is in the car with him. He can’t help wondering if it was the best thing for him, though; he hasn’t been in the park since Haru was there, and he can see him struggling whether he wants to admit it or not. The dolphins help a little, at first. Then, slowly, the infection that claimed the others takes them too, and Rin is alone again.

The night the last dolphin dies, Rin says he’s going to see Haru. Aiichirou panics before he can process it all—begs him not to, clings to the back of his shirt—but finally, Rin turns back at him, smiles gently, and ruffles his hair.

“You come too, then,” he says. And they sit on the beach together for a long time, bathed in the still moonlight, never quite as bright as that night. Rin talks about the dolphins. Aiichirou listens, even if he knows that he’s not the only one Rin is talking to.

He isn’t quite sure when their relationship starts to become something else. Perhaps it’s because the balance changes from him looking up to Rin to Rin leaning on him for support, and then gradually wavers back towards the middle. Obviously, Haru is a factor as well; but he’s a factor in the way that Aiichirou’s birth-mother was a factor in his father remarrying fifteen years after their divorce.

Aiichirou doesn’t have illusions. He knows that Rin still loves him, but it’s fine. What they have is separate, and Rin even mentions that, when he thinks about it, Haru probably saw them ending up together, too.

“ _I_ didn’t,” says Aiichirou. “I hoped so, though.”

Rin pulls him up onto his lap and holds him, and he buries his face immediately into his neck. Rin always seems so surprised when he does that—but Aiichirou doesn’t know why, because surely someone like him is used to people wanting to be as close to him as possible.

All this time, Aiichirou is waiting for the right moment to tell Rin what Haruka had asked him to. Sometimes he tries to force it out, but it seems to curl up stubbornly under his tongue and muddle up everything else instead, so he ends up blurting things like “your hair looks nice” and “I like your feet”. After a while he begins to seriously question what Rin is doing with him at all.

He’s glad that Rin doesn’t do the same. In fact, as the months melt together and slowly turn into a year since the Incident, Rin seems more content than ever. Aiichirou prepares for backsliding near the time of Haru’s disappearance, but forgets to count the anniversary of Rin’s return to Iwatobi: the first time he saw Haru again, and the day Makoto arrived at the Iwatobi Aquarium. A month before he predicted, Rin asks for time off work and slides back into his depression.

Aiichirou knows better than to take his illness personally. He also knows better than to leave Rin alone with his thoughts, so he spends most of the month dragging him along to festivals and other shallow excuses for nights out, or simply on walks with Keiko.

In his current state, Rin doesn’t appreciate much of it. Aiichirou does his best to be patient, but he gets tired. Dragging Rin every step of the way simply has to be done if he’s ever to get through this, but he seems to be making every effort _not_ to be dragged; he’s even pulling Aiichirou back with him in the opposite direction.

Rei and Nagisa notice, of course. The most they can do is be there—though Rei, at least, offers to give Rin another talking to. Aiichirou brushes him off gently. Neither of them can explain what happened that night and that’s the only thing that can really help.

It’s then that he remembers again what Haru had wanted him to say. If this isn’t the time to tell him, when is?

When it has been one year since Haru’s disappearance, he takes Rin back to the beach. He tells him, “‘It wasn’t your fault.’”

Rin looks at him. “What?”

“Nanase—Haru. He told me he wanted you to know. Oh, and: ‘I’m sorry’.” Aiichirou fidgets with the hem of his shirt. “It was last year, back before—when I interviewed him. I couldn’t figure out the right way to tell you.”

Rin looks down at his feet. His shoulders start to shake, and Nitori quickly takes hold of his hands, until he sees he’s laughing, not crying. “Couldn’t tell me himself, huh? That’s just like Haru. That guy is so hopeless.”

Aiichirou laughs along with him, albeit a little nervously. Then he squeezes Rin’s hands tighter.

“There’s… something else. Only I wasn’t sure if you’d like it.” He leads him down the beach a little further, to where a small, wooden rowboat is resting in the sand. “I—I rented it. I thought maybe—maybe we could go out on the water, and just… I don’t know. Think about them.”

“Ai…” Rin blinks hard, like he always does when he’s trying not to cry. “You sure?”

“I am. I’ll row! Do you want to?” Aiichirou looks up at him, hopefully. After a moment, Rin nods.

“Yeah. Sure.”

The sea is flat and calm as they draw out into the cove, the beach becoming a long, thin smudge of white in the distance. Once they reach the mouth of the bay, Aiichirou pulls the oars up into the rowlock while Rin leans over the side, staring into the water. He wonders what he’s looking at down there. All he can see when he glances overboard is dark, glossy water reflecting the light of the crescent moon.

Then, Rin shouts and points further out to sea. Aiichirou has to grab him around the waist to stop him from standing up and capsizing them, but he lets go when he sees what he’s pointing at.

Carving the surface of the water is a tall, black fin.

Aiichirou doesn’t pretend to be an expert, and in this light it’s really too difficult to make out any proper details. But he feels that he’s seen that fin before. “Rin, could it be…?”

“No. It’s not. There’s no way.” Rin shakes his head in disbelief, but Nitori sees him gripping the edge of the boat tighter.

A smaller fin rises up beside the first. Slowly, the two whales surface, neck in neck, so close as to be touching. They exhale towering plumes of salt-water, then dive back down again. The next time they resurface they’re so close to the boat Aiichirou can feel it rocking each time their tails move. Rin hesitates, then holds out his hand to them.

The smaller whale brushes against it gingerly. The larger whale keeps his distance, circling them slowly. Aiichirou leans against Rin silently as he strokes the whale’s sleek rostrum, smiling, tears rolling down his cheeks.

The moon glows brighter against the water’s surface.

Midnight falls.


End file.
